{"id":12271,"date":"2011-01-07T17:21:58","date_gmt":"2011-01-07T22:21:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=12271"},"modified":"2011-01-07T17:21:58","modified_gmt":"2011-01-07T22:21:58","slug":"fun-in-philly-game-preview-of-bulls-at-sixers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/fun-in-philly-game-preview-of-bulls-at-sixers-12271\/","title":{"rendered":"Fun In Philly: Game Preview of Bulls at Sixers"},"content":{"rendered":"

Chicago Bulls AT Philadelphia 76ers
\nJanuary 7th, 2011 at 7:00 PM EST
\nOpening Line: Chicago -1
\nCurrent Line:\u00a0 Chicago -1.5
\nOpening Total: 191
\nCurrent Total: 190
\nOpening Moneyline: Chicago -105 \/ Philadelphia +115
\nCurrent Moneyline:\u00a0 Chicago -120 \/ Philadelphia +100<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"
Boozer was inexplicably benched for the last 14 minutes of the Bulls' outing against the Nets<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Chicago comes into tonight’s game as winners of 7 of their last 10 games, and they currently sit half a game ahead of Orlando in the 3 spot of the East, but they are 3.5 games behind #2 Miami and 4 full games behind Conference leading Boston.\u00a0 Philadelphia has played decent basketball since going on a hot streak that was sparked by their strong defensive play.\u00a0 They have won but 4 of their last 10, and despite being 7 games under .500 they are still in the 8th spot in the Eastern Conference and would face the Celtics if the Playoffs started today.<\/p>\n

Chicago last lost on a buzzer beating layup by Sasha Vujacic in New Jersey.\u00a0 Mysteriously, their big free agent signing, Carlos Boozer, sat the last 14 minutes of the game.\u00a0 Star point guard Derrick Rose commented, \u201cYeah, we were surprised (Boozer didn\u2019t come back in).\u00a0 But we\u2019re not going to try to coach. We\u2019re going to do our jobs and that\u2019s to play. We\u2019re going to leave the subbing up to (coach Tom Thibodeau).\u201d\u00a0 The Bulls trailed by 13 going into the last quarter, and even without Boozer they cut the lead down and tied the score before the buzzer beater by Vujacic.<\/p>\n

The last time these teams met, Chicago romped the Sixers, winning by 45 points, but the line set by NBA oddsmakers for tonight is close, perhaps because of the Sixers strong play at home (9-6), but certainly NOT predicated upon the last meeting between the teams.<\/p>\n

Some betting trends:<\/p>\n

Chicago is 5-1 SU in their last 6 games and they have went 2-5 ATS in their last 7 games.\u00a0 The total has gone UNDER in 10 of their last 14 games on the road.\u00a0 Chicago is 4-2 SU in their last 6 road games and 5-1 SU in their last 6 against Philly.\u00a0 The total has gone OVER in 10 of their last 12 games in Philadelphia and it has gone OVER in 5 of the last 6 road games against Philadelphia.<\/p>\n

The total has gone OVER In 4 of Phillly’s last 5 games.\u00a0 It has gone OVER In 5 of their last 7 at home, as well.\u00a0 They are 8-2 SU in their last 10 home games and 2-5 ATS in their last 7 games against the Bulls.<\/p>\n

Key Matchups:
\n
\nDerrick Rose vs Jrue Holiday<\/strong><\/p>\n

Jrue Holiday has impressed Sixers management and fans and appears to be a part of their long term plans, as a key cornerstone of the franchise.\u00a0 Looking at his season stats, it’s easy to see why.\u00a0 He’s currently averaging 14.6 points per game and 6.5 assists per game (19th in the league) and is coming off an impressive 26 point, 9 assist, 4 rebound game in their trouncing of the Toronto Raptors on Wednesday night.\u00a0 Last game against the Bulls, he managed only 9 points, but that was due to the fact that he only played 22 minutes since the game was not close at any point.\u00a0 He has the size to matchup against Derrick Rose (he’s 6’4″) but will have a tough time with the All-star, who is averaging 23.8 points a game.\u00a0 Rose hasn’t played his best ball recently, however, as he has scored under 20 in 3 of the last 5 games and he managed only one assist in the last game against New Jersey.\u00a0 In the blowout last game between these teams he went for 22 points and 12 assists in only 19 minutes of play. Holiday is a good defender, but the problem is that when he gets beat on the dribble, Philly’s interior defense is weak and won’t be able to mask his blunder.
\n
\nCarlos Boozer vs Elton Brand<\/strong><\/p>\n

There was a time in Brand’s career when he would easily get the best of Boozer in this matchup, but since his knee surgery that preceeded his signing with the Sixers, he has never been the same and at age 31, he’s put a lot of “miles” on his surgically repaired knee.\u00a0 That said, he is still a productive player and is having his best season since joining the Sixers.\u00a0 He’s averaging 14.9 points per game and 8.7 boards a night in 34 minutes of play and he’s averaged 15.5 points and 8 boards over his last two games.\u00a0 Boozer, as mentioned previously, was benched for the last 14 minutes of the loss to New Jersey, but is expected to start tonight.\u00a0 He’s had a double double in his last 4 meetings against the Sixers and is just shy of having a typical for him 20-10 season this year.<\/p>\n

The line is set closer than I would imagine for a meeting between these teams and Chicago looks like a good bet to cover the spread.\u00a0 They did demolish the Sixers last meeting between the teams and Vegas oddsmakers have mysteriously set the line close on this one.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Chicago Bulls AT Philadelphia 76ers January 7th, 2011 at 7:00 PM EST Opening Line: Chicago -1 Current Line:\u00a0 Chicago -1.5 Opening Total: 191 Current Total: 190 Opening Moneyline: Chicago -105 \/ Philadelphia +115 Current Moneyline:\u00a0 Chicago -120 \/ Philadelphia +100 Chicago comes into tonight’s game as winners of 7 of their last 10 games, and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40250,"featured_media":5134,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444,133],"tags":[174,832],"class_list":["post-12271","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","category-nba-handicapping","tag-chicago-bulls","tag-philadelphia-76ers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12271","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/40250"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12271"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12271\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12273,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12271\/revisions\/12273"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5134"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12271"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12271"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12271"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}