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03/09/2010 - (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - A pair of playoff hopefuls will try to avoid third consecutive losses tonight when the Atlanta Thrashers host the Nashville Predators at Philips Arena.
Both the Thrashers and Predators came out of the Olympic break with back-to- back victories, but have since dropped two straight.
With less than 20 games remaining on their schedules, neither team can afford a long losing streak at this stage of the season. Atlanta is currently 10th in the East and three points out of a playoff spot. Nashville is seventh in the Western Conference and just one point ahead of Detroit, which is holding on to the West's eighth and final postseason slot.
Atlanta, which made its only trip to the postseason in the spring of 2007, has been outscored 10-2 in its last two games. The Thrashers were dealt a 6-2 loss Saturday in Tampa and were blanked 4-0 the following night by visiting Carolina. Manny Legace stopped 27 shots to pick up his first shutout of the season in Carolina's win on Sunday.
Ondrej Pavelec turned aside 29-of-33 shots for the Thrashers.
"The game was obviously not what we wanted to happen," Thrashers head coach John Anderson said. "There is still time. We have to lick our wounds and get right back at it."
Atlanta is 15-11-4 as the host this year and had won three straight on home ice prior to the loss against the Hurricanes. The Thrashers' next test is in Columbus on Thursday but the club will then begin a five-game homestand, starting with Friday's test against the New York Rangers.
Meanwhile, Nashville, which is 17-13-3 as the guest this year, is kicking off a four-game road trip tonight.
The Preds were dealt a 4-2 loss Sunday by visiting Vancouver after Jannik Hansen scored the game-winner in the third period. All told, the Canucks scored three times in the final stanza to erase a 2-1 deficit after 40 minutes.
Jason Arnott and Jordin Tootoo each had a goal for the Predators, while Pekka Rinne gave up three goals on 27 shots.
"For the most part we did a pretty good job," said Nashville head coach Barry Trotz. "They're a good hockey team and you have to limit their chances and I think we did. They just made the most of the ones they did have."
Trotz will aim for his 400th career victory tonight and he can become just the seventh coach in NHL history to reach that mark with one team. Trotz is Nashville's only head coach since the franchise entered the league for the 1998-99 season.
Predators defenseman Shea Weber is expected to miss his second straight game tonight with an upper-body injury suffered Friday against Detroit. Weber is Nashville's top scoring defenseman with 36 points on the year.
Nashville posted a 4-3 home win over the Thrashers on January 30. The Preds have taken three of the last four meetings in the series, but they have just one win in their last five trips to Atlanta.
<< 2010 Southeastern Conference Tournament Preview
Philadelphia, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The competition level will be through the
roof in Nashville this week, as all 12 SEC teams will compete in the 51st
annual conference tournament. On the line is an automatic bid to the NCAA
Tournament, and th
<< 2010 Mountain West Conference Tournament Preview
Philadelphia, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - It is the usual suspects that are destined
to do the most damage in Las Vegas this week, as the members of the Mountain
West Conference descend on the Thomas & Mack Center for the 11th annual
conference t
<< 2010 Pac-10 Conference Tournament Preview
Philadelphia, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Nine team will converge on the Staples
Center in Los Angeles to compete for the Pac-10 Conference Tournament
championship beginning on Wednesday, March 10th.
The only member of the league that isn't compet
<< 2010 Big West Conference Tournament Preview
Philadelphia, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The 35th annual Big West Conference
Tournament will once again take place at the Anaheim Convention Center Arena
for a tenth straight season. The bottom four seeds of the eight-team field
will take part in fi
2010 Big Ten Conference Tournament Preview >>
Philadelphia, PA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The 13th Annual Big Ten Conference
Tournament gets underway on Thursday, March 11th from Conseco Fieldhouse in
Indianapolis, Indiana. Purdue is the defending tournament champion, having
topped Ohio State in l
Blazers welcome Kings to Rose Garden >>
(Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The Portland Trail Blazers hope to bounce back from one of
their worst defensive performances of the season tonight when they take on the
Sacramento Kings at the Rose Garden.
Carmelo Anthony posted 30 points on Sunday to
Flyers try to continue mastery of Isles >>
(Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The Philadelphia Flyers will be attempting to extend their
current home winning streak in tonight's matchup with a New York Islanders
team they've dominated over the past few seasons from the Wachovia Center.
The Flyers ha
Jazz open trek against Bulls >>
(Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The surging Utah Jazz hope to keep the pressure on
Northwest Division-leading Denver when they begin a four-game road trip in the
Windy City against a reeling Chicago Bulls team.
Traditionally the Jazz don't per
MySportsbook.com: New College Football Clock Rules Examined
Coaches and bettors alike are desperate to make sense of the new time-keeping rules on the NCAA gridiron. One of the big stories to come out of the Ohio State-Texas clash last weekend was Texas coach Mack Brown's criticism of the NCAA's new clock rules that are intended to shorten the duration of college football games, therefore affecting college football betting.
"They scored with six minutes left and the game was over before we had a chance to do anything," Brown told ESPN.com. "I really hope whoever made these changes will go back and look them over."
Sure, it might be sour grapes; the Buckeyes thoroughly trounced the defending national champion Longhorns 24-7. However, Brown isn't alone in giving the changes their due thought. Bettors are also wondering about them, albeit for a completely different reason. Most experts agree that the changes will result in games being shortened by anywhere from 10 to 20 plays. The obvious consequence is lower scores, with more time rolling off the clock during changes of possession. (The Ohio State-Texas game flew well under the total of 52.)
According to research at the online sportsbook MySportsbook.com, more than 18 plays a game disappeared last weekend into thin air. That's a 10-percent reduction. In 2005, a typical game had 168.58 plays. For 2007 already, it's down to 150.26.
As a result, teams combined to gain an average of about 100 fewer yards a game last weekend versus the 2005 openers. Scoring was also down by about 4.5 points (attention Las Vegas sports lines).
Of course, oddsmakers were able to adjust to the changes before the season started. Proof of that came as the over went a balanced 8-9 at My Sportsbook on Saturday.
Other angles to consider:A shorter game should theoretically result in shorter lines. Whereas Team A might have been a 14-point favorite in a 168-play game (last year), if there are 10 percent less snaps in 2007, the line should also be reduced by 10 percent (to 13 or 12.5). Of course, this is an over-simplification of the matter, but something to keep in mind.
Less possessions means a better chance the game will be decided by three or seven points. For example, what might have been a 20-10 final score in 2005 may end at
17-10 in 2007. Granted, a 24-17 game last year might end at 21-17 these days, but the former - a three- or seven-point advantage being preserved as opposed to created - is the most likely scenario.
*UPDATE* - Sept. 25, 2007
New Clock Rules Boon for online bookmakers
By adjusting the time-keeping rules to shorten the duration of college football games, the NCAA hoped to make its product more enjoyable for the fans. While the NCAA's success in this regard is still up for debate, bookmakers couldn't be happier with the results.
"We are seeing a massive jump in college football betting," noted the MySportsbook.com management team. "With all the early Saturday games (12 a.m. ET) ending before the second wave begins (3:30 p.m. ET) - something that didn't always happen before the changes - bettors are now able to re-invest their winnings from the morning session in the afternoon games."
While not all bettors will choose to roll over their winnings, it doesn't take much for an impact to be seen on the bottom line. "Not all of the millions of dollars in morning payouts get re-bet. In fact, it's probably only 10 to 20 percent," noted the sportsbook management team. "Still, the increased football betting lines window will create a ton of growth for us over the course of the season."
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My fellow Americans, as tempting as it may be to don the coat and HD-ready tie in order to deliver this State of the Game address before the cameras, I know better. As Brad Paisley sings on his latest album, "I'm so much cooler online."
The ideas for this annual essay to kick off the MySportsbook.com college football betting preview flowed like frat-house beer, which is to say they were cheap and spilled all over the floor. The 2007 season will be better than 2007, if only because there will be more of it. A year ago, the NCAA Football Rules Committee made two rule changes in the interest of speeding up the game. These changes went over like Kobe burgers at a vegan banquet.
To its credit, the rules committee rectified its mistakes. This season the clock once again will start when a kickoff is received, rather than when it is kicked, and the clock will not start so quickly on a change of possession.
However, kickoffs have been moved back five yards, to the 30, which will force more returns. (Thus forcing the clock to run. Clever, huh?) Special teams might decide a lot of games, because coaching strategy will come straight out of another new Paisley lyric (almost), I'd like to check you for kicks.
Paisley sings with a twang, which is why he's appropriate for this college football season. The sun coming up over the 2007 college football betting lines season rises from the south. It's a Southern football world. As the Southeastern Conference begins its 75th year, the power shift is noticeable.
Eight-figure budgets, glamorous settings -- and that's just for the head coaches. The SEC has four coaches who have won national championships -- the greatest aggregation of coaching know-how since Eddie Robinson dined alone.
Steve Spurrier, Phil Fulmer, Nick Saban and Urban Meyer have given lie to the idea that a conference championship game is too daunting a hurdle on the road to No. 1. In six of the past 10 seasons, the national champions played and won a conference championship game -- three of the six (Tennessee, 1998; LSU, 2003; Florida, 2007) from the SEC.
There will be more of the same this season, if the preseason prognostications are correct. Six SEC teams are in the preseason coaches' poll, more than from any other conference. Only one conference has talent so deep that a team with 15 returning starters, including the best quarterback in the league, from an eight-win season is considered an afterthought. That may speak more to Kentucky's losing legacy than to the wisdom of the predictions, but there you have it. And seriously, keep an eye on Wildcats QB Andre' Woodson.
The reach of the South extends all the way to No. 1. Take a look at the team that is a consensus pick to win the national championship. The quarterback is from Shreveport. The best wide receiver is from Nashville. The top recruit is from New Orleans.
So what's the campus doing in Los Angeles? Hey, it is the University of Southern California.
USC lost two Pacific-10 Conference games a year ago, the first time that had happened in five seasons, and university officials withstood the urge to form blue-ribbon panels to unearth the cause of such a disaster. Instead, the Trojans gathered themselves and routed Michigan, 32-18, in the Rose Bowl.
USC's losses at Oregon State and at UCLA last year should have given pause to those who question the Pac-10's football prowess (such as, without naming names, L.M. from Baton Rouge). The league only got deeper this season; Dennis Erickson is taking over an Arizona State team that never quite got out of its own way under his predecessor, Dirk Koetter.
Erickson will resume his quest to become the first coach to win a national championship at two schools. Both he and Spurrier, now in his third season at South Carolina, returned to college football at schools with lower profiles than where they won their titles.
That isn't the case for the third coach looking for the national championship double. You may have missed this, but NASA reported the astronauts on the space shuttle last spring made contact with what can only be described as beings from another galaxy.
The leader of the aliens said, "We come in peace," followed by, "So how do you think Nick Saban will do at Alabama?"
The public is reacting to the new Crimson Tide coach as if he is the Barry Bonds of college football -- beloved at home for what his fans believe he is going to do, hated on the road for his intimidating attitude and for what his detractors believe he did (bend NCAA recruiting rules). I made this comparison from the dais at a charity dinner in Mobile, Ala., last month, and the chill that washed over me didn't come from the air conditioning.
Saban will attempt to prove that he can remake in Tuscaloosa what he built in Baton Rouge, much like another member of the national championship fraternity. Bobby Bowden is attempting to remake at Florida State what he built at, um, Florida State. Bowden rebuilt his offensive staff, bringing in four new coaches led by Saban's former offensive coordinator, Jimbo Fisher, to jump-start an offense that has been dead for a couple of years.
The Atlantic Coast Conference is expected to show new signs of life, too. That is said with no disrespect toward last season's champion, Wake Forest, which provided one of the best story lines of 2007. The Demon Deacons begin this season in their customary position, overshadowed by the Virginia Techs, Miamis and Florida States.
It's not that Wake will find it difficult to duplicate its success in 2007 as much as the feeling that success engendered. Surprising success is the narcotic of sport. It never feels quite so euphoric the next time. Big East commissioner Mike Tranghese has figured this out. He refers to 2007, when a league looked down upon by fans and foes alike took three undefeated teams into November, as "Cinderella."
The fairy tale may be over, but the Big East has four genuine Heisman Trophy candidates in Louisville quarterback Brian Brohm, West Virginia tailback Steve Slaton and quarterback Pat White, and Rutgers tailback Ray Rice. Rutgers, as did Wake Forest and, of course, Boise State, proved last season that the have-nots in college football occasionally have quite a lot.
The Broncos' rousing 43-42 overtime victory over Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl has raised the profile of all schools in conferences that don't get automatic BCS bids. This season, TCU and Hawaii are the preseason favorites to burst through the BCS doors and earn an at-large bid. The Warriors return 14 starters from an 11-3 team, including quarterback Colt Brennan.
Brennan not only broke the single-season record with 58 touchdown passes in 2007, but he also led Division I-A in passing efficiency (186.0). The senior is expected to contend for the Heisman Trophy, and neither his success nor the rise of his team should come as any surprise in the 2007 season.
After all, Hawaii is the southernmost team in the country.
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