{"id":14668,"date":"2011-04-04T23:46:04","date_gmt":"2011-04-05T04:46:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=14668"},"modified":"2011-04-05T09:45:09","modified_gmt":"2011-04-05T14:45:09","slug":"pro-basketball-betting-bulls-go-for-season-sweep-of-suns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/pro-basketball-betting-bulls-go-for-season-sweep-of-suns-14668\/","title":{"rendered":"Pro Basketball Betting: Bulls go for season sweep of Suns"},"content":{"rendered":"

Phoenix Suns at Chicago Bulls, United Center, Chicago, IL<\/strong>
\nTuesday, April 5, 2011, 8:00 pm Eastern, TV:\u00a0 My45, WCIU<\/strong>
\nOpening Line: Bulls -9.5<\/strong>
\nCurrent Line: Bulls -10.5<\/strong>
\nOpening Total: 204 <\/strong>
\nCurrent Total: 203.5 <\/strong>
\nMoney Line: Bulls -700 \/ Suns +550
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Bulls
Derrick Rose and the Bulls are 2.5 games ahead of Miami for the top seed in the Eastern Conference.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Chicago Bulls (56-20) continue to close in on the top seed in the Eastern Conference playoff race and host the Phoenix Suns (37-39) on Tuesday in one of their final three home games of the regular season.\u00a0 The Bulls (-10.5) own the best home record in the East at 33-5 and will try to complete the season series sweep of the Suns following their epic 123-115 double-overtime road victory in the first meeting back on November 24.<\/p>\n

Chicago trailed Phoenix by as many as 23 points in the first quarter of that game but rallied back behind NBA MVP candidate Derrick Rose, who scored a game-high 35 points, grabbed 12 rebounds and dished out seven assists.\u00a0 Rose tied the game in the final second of the first overtime with a layup and then scored the first five points of the second extra session before fouling out.\u00a0 The Bulls started the second overtime on a 10-2 run to earn the win.<\/p>\n

One could argue that Rose began his MVP campaign in that game, and he has carried the team ever since.\u00a0 He hopes to have center Joakim Noah back from a three-game absence due to a sprained ankle even though Carlos Boozer has stepped up his play during that stretch.\u00a0 Chicago has won all three of those games with Boozer averaging 21.3 points and 10.7 rebounds.\u00a0 He missed practice on Monday with an illness while Noah worked out with the team.<\/p>\n

The Bulls have struggled a bit defensively over the last nine games with the OVER cashing eight times.\u00a0 They are giving up nearly 96 points per game over that span after allowing less than 90 in 11 of their previous 12 with the UNDER going 10-2.\u00a0 The UNDER is 7-1 in the last eight games against Central Division opponents for the Suns, who have also seen the UNDER go 7-2 in the past nine meetings in Chicago.<\/p>\n

Phoenix has lost four of the last five meetings both straight-up and against the spread and was officially eliminated from playoff contention after dropping five of the team\u2019s past six games overall.\u00a0 The Suns have split their last two games without point guard Steven Nash, who has been suffering from flu-like symptoms.\u00a0 Aaron Brooks is averaging 13 points and six assists in Nash\u2019s place.<\/p>\n

All of the pressure is on the Bulls in this spot, and they have failed to cover the spread in their last two games despite beating Detroit and Toronto.\u00a0 The Raptors outscored Chicago 63-60 in the second half on Saturday after trailing by 10 points at halftime.\u00a0 Phoenix plays a similar style and will likely look to run from the start, especially if Nash is back on the floor as expected.<\/p>\n

If you are betting this NBA basketball game between the Bulls & Suns, make sure to check out the winning basketball NBA picks packages we offer.\u00a0 You can also get free winners on our free NBA picks page.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Phoenix Suns at Chicago Bulls, United Center, Chicago, IL Tuesday, April 5, 2011, 8:00 pm Eastern, TV:\u00a0 My45, WCIU Opening Line: Bulls -9.5 Current Line: Bulls -10.5 Opening Total: 204 Current Total: 203.5 Money Line: Bulls -700 \/ Suns +550 The Chicago Bulls (56-20) continue to close in on the top seed in the Eastern […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":194,"featured_media":9329,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444,133],"tags":[4814,174,4438,4439,1985,577,4440],"class_list":["post-14668","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","category-nba-handicapping","tag-bulls-suns-preview","tag-chicago-bulls","tag-free-pro-basketball-pick","tag-nba-basketball-odds","tag-nba-picks","tag-phoenix-suns","tag-pro-basketball-betting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14668","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=14668"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14668\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14670,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14668\/revisions\/14670"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9329"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14668"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14668"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14668"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}