{"id":14556,"date":"2011-03-30T23:53:25","date_gmt":"2011-03-31T04:53:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=14556"},"modified":"2011-04-02T01:40:46","modified_gmt":"2011-04-02T06:40:46","slug":"nba-tv-betting-celtics-visit-spurs-in-possible-nba-finals-preview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/nba-tv-betting-celtics-visit-spurs-in-possible-nba-finals-preview-14556\/","title":{"rendered":"NBA TV Betting: Celtics visit Spurs in possible NBA Finals preview"},"content":{"rendered":"

Boston Celtics at San Antonio Spurs, AT&T Center, San Antonio, TX<\/strong>
\nThursday, March 31, 2011, 8:00 pm Eastern, TV: TNT<\/strong>
\nOpening Line: Spurs Pick’em<\/strong>
\nCurrent Line: Spurs -2<\/strong>
\nOpening Total: 187.5<\/strong>
\nCurrent Total: 187.5<\/strong>
\nMoney Line: Spurs -130 \/ Celtics +110
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Spurs
Boston's Rajon Rondo could have a matchup advantage if San Antonio's Tony Parker misses another game.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The San Antonio Spurs (57-17) have dropped four straight games overall and at home against the Boston Celtics (51-22) heading into Thursday\u2019s nationally televised showdown at the AT&T Center on TNT.\u00a0 The Spurs (-2) and Celtics seemed to be headed for a matchup in the NBA Finals for much of the regular season, but both teams have endured some bumps in the road lately, altering that course a bit and giving other contenders the chance to catch them.<\/p>\n

San Antonio still owns the best record in the league despite its recent skid and hopes to get some key players back for this game.\u00a0 The Spurs played without Tim Duncan (ankle), Tony Parker (knee), Manu Ginobili (thigh) and Antonio McDyess (back) in Monday\u2019s 100-92 home loss to Portland and may only get Parker back against Boston.\u00a0 They have not dropped five in a row since losing their last six of the 1996-97 season and could see the Dallas Mavericks or the defending NBA champion Los Angeles Lakers draw even closer to the top seed with a loss.<\/p>\n

The Mavericks and Lakers square off in the second game of the TNT doubleheader, and each of them are within five games of San Antonio with two weeks left in the regular season.\u00a0 The Spurs certainly want to retain homecourt advantage against any future opponent in the playoffs because they have the NBA\u2019s best home record at 33-4.<\/p>\n

The Celtics have already lost their grip on the top seed in the Eastern Conference and could fall to third behind Chicago and Miami with a loss at San Antonio.\u00a0 They have not lost four in a row straight-up but have failed to cover the spread in their last four along with 10 of 14.<\/p>\n

Boston did get point guard Rajon Rondo back in a 107-100 loss at Indiana on Monday after he missed the previous game with a finger injury.\u00a0 Rondo scored 22 points and dished out eight assists against the Pacers following an eight-game stretch that saw him average 5.8 points on 29.2 percent shooting.\u00a0 Paul Pierce led the way with 23 points while Glen Davis added 20 off the bench.\u00a0 Kevin Garnett and Nenad Krstic both battled foul trouble and combined for 13 points and eight rebounds.\u00a0 The total went OVER for the first time in 11 games, as the team surrendered more than 90 points for the first time since March 9.<\/p>\n

San Antonio has won just one of the last four meetings with the Celtics, who will be going for their fifth consecutive road victory in the series.\u00a0 The Spurs have covered the last two games between the teams though with the UNDER cashing in three of the past four.<\/p>\n

Our NBA basketball handicappers are red hot as the regular season enters the final stretch. Don\u2019t miss out on any more NBA betting winners this season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Boston Celtics at San Antonio Spurs, AT&T Center, San Antonio, TX Thursday, March 31, 2011, 8:00 pm Eastern, TV: TNT Opening Line: Spurs Pick’em Current Line: Spurs -2 Opening Total: 187.5 Current Total: 187.5 Money Line: Spurs -130 \/ Celtics +110 The San Antonio Spurs (57-17) have dropped four straight games overall and at home […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":194,"featured_media":4386,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444,133],"tags":[120,4438,4439,1985,4440,141,4786],"class_list":["post-14556","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","category-nba-handicapping","tag-boston-celtics","tag-free-pro-basketball-pick","tag-nba-basketball-odds","tag-nba-picks","tag-pro-basketball-betting","tag-san-antonio-spurs","tag-spurs-celtics-preview"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14556","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\/194"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14556"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14556\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14620,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14556\/revisions\/14620"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4386"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14556"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14556"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14556"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}