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03/14/2010 - (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - After three straight come-from-behind victories, the Sharks finally ran out of magic on Saturday. Good thing they haven't need much when facing the Ducks this year.
San Jose kicks off a six-game road trip this evening versus Anaheim at the Honda Center aiming to sweep the season series for the first time in 11 seasons.
The Sharks are leading the Western Conference with 96 points, three more than the second-place Blackhawks and are also three points back of Washington for the most in the NHL.
The club took a three-game winning streak into Saturday's meeting with Florida, a run in which San Jose had to rally in each game after being down heading into the third period. The Sharks then jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the first period yesterday, but failed to score again and ended up losing a 3-2 overtime decision to the Panthers.
Patrick Marleau and Ryane Clowe scored for the Sharks, who went 3-1-1 on a five-game homestand. Making his first start since Feb. 10, Thomas Greiss had 25 saves but allowed the winner at the 2:46 mark of overtime to Bryan Allen.
"We've got to put it behind us," said Sharks head coach Todd McLellan. "We accomplished a couple things tonight. We came out and we had a little fire in our belly and we played extremely hard in the first period but we let it get away from us though and that's the inconsistency in our game right now."
San Jose now hits the road for six straight and has won 10 of its last 12 as the guest. It opens the swing in Anaheim and will look to sweep the season series with the Ducks for the first time since it took all six meetings in 1997-98.
Anaheim eliminated top-seeded San Jose in last year's opening round of the playoffs as the eighth seed, but has been outscored 19-7 in losing all five regular season meetings this year. The Sharks have won six straight and eight of the last nine regular-season meetings overall, including four straight in Anaheim.
The Ducks have not been able to slow down the Sharks' top line of Joe Thornton, Dany Heatley and Marleau. Thornton has nine assists and 13 points versus the Ducks this year, while Marleau has five goals and 10 points. Heatley has chipped in with two goals and five assists as well.
Meanwhile, San Jose netminder Evgeni Nabokov, who should get the start tonight, has a 1.40 goals-against average while winning all five meetings.
Anaheim comes into this matchup struggling, as it has dropped a season high- tying five games in a row and has yet to win since the Olympic break ended. The Ducks were shut out for the second time on their current slide Friday, losing 1-0 to Nashville.
Jonas Hiller stopped 27 shots and the only goal in the contest came on a Predators power play with the Ducks down two men in the opening period. Anaheim, meanwhile, failed to get any of its 31 shots past Predators goaltender Pekka Rinne.
"We didn't really have a glorious number of chances in tonight's hockey game," said Anaheim head coach Randy Carlyle. "It was tight and it seemed they were content playing that way once they got the 5-on-3 goal. They were keeping four guys above the puck as much as possible and trying to block people out. We had some chances. We just weren't able to get one to go into the net for us."
The Ducks, who are 10 points out of a playoff spot, have now matched their 0-2-3 rut from Nov. 29-Dec. 6 and will try to avoid their first six-game slide since Jan. 20-Feb. 2, 2008.
Anaheim, which has been outscored 18-8 on its five-game slide, is 0-2-1 on a seven-game homestand and has lost four in a row as the host since a franchise- record 11-game home winning streak.
Hiller is 0-3-0 with a 3.03 GAA this year versus the Sharks and just 1-8-0 against them lifetime with a 2.49 GAA.
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In any football or basketball game (the main sports that use point spreads) there are two teams playing against each other.
Those teams, though, are rarely exactly evenly matched – meaning that typically one team has a better chance than the other to win the game. If bettors were allowed to bet on who was simply going to win the game, smart ones would obviously bet on the better team (likely winning more than 50% of the time in the process).
If winning were that easy the Las Vegas and online sportsbooks would stop taking any bets! This is where the point spread comes in: the basic function of the point spread is to balance the likelihood of each team “winning” by adjusting the final score by the point spread. After this adjustment is made you get the Against The Spread result (ATS result for short).
Let’s look at Super Bowl XXXIX, New England Patriots vs. Philadelphia Eagles. Most people believed the defending champ Patriots to be the better team – so if betting were simply based upon which team would win the game, an uneven majority of people would have wagered on New England. But, by using the point spread, the bookmakers adjusted the terms of the bet, evening the proposition so about half the people believed the Pats to be the smart bet, while the other half considered Philly to be the smart bet.
New England Patriots -7 vs. Philadelphia Eagles
The better team, called the Favorite, is expected to win the game and must “give” or “lay” points to the weaker team. The favorite is listed with a minus sign and the number of points they are favored by (e.g., New England -7)
In the case of our example, New England must not only win the game, but they must win by more than 7 points for Pats bettors to have a winning ATS result. An Eagles bettor wins his bet either if:
There was also the possibility that the final score could land exactly on the spread number (for example, the Pats winning 28-21 when -7), which is called a “push” or “no action” and a refund is then issued to bettors of both teams.
The same game with the same point spread can be considered from the weaker team’s perspective: The Underdog (Philly in the case of our example) is not expected to win the game and thus receives or “gets” points given by the stronger team. When a game is stated from the underdog’s perspective the team is listed with a plus sign and the number of points they are underdogs by:
Philadelphia Eagles +7 vs. New England Patriots
Keep in mind that Philadelphia +7 and New England -7 is the same point spread on the same game, simply stated differently. The first is from the underdog’s perspective; the later is from the favorite’s.
Not a must, but for some a mathematical approach is insightful. You can determine the ATS winner by either:
Let’s look at the actual result of Super Bowl XXXIX: New England 24 Philadelphia 21
The favorite, New England, won the game but not by more than the point spread they were favored by (7), so the ATS result was a LOSS for Pats bettors.
Looking at it from the underdog’s perspective, Philly did not win the game, but they lost by less than the point spread (7), so the ATS result was a WIN for Eagle bettors.
Mathematically considered, 24 for the favorite Pats minus 7 equals 17, which is less than the 20 the Eagles scored, so the underdog Eagles win the ATS result (or you could figure 20 plus 7 equals 27 for the Eagles, which is more than 24 for the Pats).
Emily’s boyfriend understood the point spread and wagered $100 on the Eagles at +7. The Eagles may not have gotten a Super Bowl ring, but since they won the ATS result Emily’s boyfriend cashed his bet – giving him money to take her out to a nice dinner.
And now hopefully you understand how to read point spreads, putting you one step closer to joining the fun of sports betting.
To visit this internet sportsbook go to MySportsbook.com for all your football betting and World Series odds.
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