[kneighfe]

Game 1 of the San Antonio Silver Stars - Los Angeles Sparks series.

INJURY UPDATE:

LA Sparks
Date	Pos	Player	Injury	Status
06/13/12	G	Sharnee' Zoll	ACL	out indefinitely

In the regular season, they played each other 4 times. 2 at LA and 2 at San Antonio. Record wise, LA is the better team finishing with 24-10 as opposed to San Antonio's 21-13; plus the home record suggests A Sparks win as they are 16-1 at home, but not so fast, as their only blemish at home came at the hands of the Silver Stars routing them 91-71.

This game will basically depend on what identity will the Silver Stars show because when they are at optimum level, they are a championship caliber team and can beat anyone, even rout anyone. They have beaten Minnesota by 15 pts (99-84), Sparks by 20 pts (91-71), Seattle by 13 pts (80-67) & 24 pts (90-66), Indiana by 16 pts (88-72), Atlanta by 19 pts (91-70), and New York by 13 pts (94-81) & 11 pts (77-66). The only team they haven't beaten by 10 or more points and haven't beaten at all are the East leading Connecticut Sun. All the teams mentioned above which they have beaten by 10 or more points are all in the playoff mix, so there is no doubt the Silver Stars can compete against the best. But can they beat the Sparks in Game 1 on the road?

The answer is they can as the Silver Stars have beaten the Sparks in 3 out of their 4 regular season matchups by an average margin of 15.67 pts but it is not a certainty.

Scoring wise, both are offensive machines as they both average a little over 80+ pts per game in the regular season. The Sparks average 86.5 pts at home (5pts better than their road avg of 81.5), while the Silver Stars average 81.7 pts on the road (82.4 at home). With both teams consistently in the 80s either at home or on the road, I see more value in going with the over but let's take a look at their head to head during the regular season:

Jun 16 vs LAS 85-99
Jun 24 @ LAS 91-71
Jun 28 vs LAS 80-94
Aug 23 @ LAS 77-101

In their 4 regular season encounters, the average total points per game is an astounding 174.25. You know that when these 2 teams meet, they are going to run and outscore each other. The lowest point total in those 4 match ups is 162 (91-71) and the highest being 184 (85-99).

FINAL VERDICT:
San Antonio Silver Stars +8.5 @ 1.751 for 5 units
Over 162.5 @ 1.819 for 10 units

[adila1401]

Careful with the over/under man, game slows down a lot in the playoffs...might wanna consider 2nd half bets to start off the playoffs in order to minimize losses just to see how they begin their post season campaign...glgl

[kneighfe]

Careful with the over/under man, game slows down a lot in the playoffs...might wanna consider 2nd half bets to start off the playoffs in order to minimize losses just to see how they begin their post season campaign...glgl

Thanks for the advice, adila1401. Well, appreciated. You are correct that the point totals in the playoffs are lower than in the regular season but I am still going with my pick as both are really high scoring teams and have been very consistent scoring around 80 pts in the regular season.

BOL to us whatever your pick may be.

[bleek88]

Silverstars win this game.

[bleek88]

SU.

[blackgolden]

my local bookie SAS +7 n 163,5

[kneighfe]

my local bookie SAS +7 n 163,5

Handicap line has already moved. Pinny no longer offers SAS +8.5, the highest you can get now from Pinny is +8 @ 2.120. Over 162.5 though, is still available at better odds, 1.854. Bookies are thinking that because this is the playoffs, the scoring will be low but I don't think this series will be one of them. Why would you deviate from your winning game play and strategy now that you're at the playoffs? Okay, teams will play tighter defense since it is already the playoffs but then again tighter defense will increase the probability of teams taking more freethrows.

Anyway, wherever all punters bets are, best of luck to all of us. Let us all help each other out in making money.

[adila1401]

best of luck to all of us. Let us all help each other out in making money.

Well put sir, I ended up going Sparks -7 and Conn -9.5..good luck today

[bleek88]

Well put sir, I ended up going Sparks -7 and Conn -9.5..good luck today

Sparks arent going to win by 7 bro sorry to spoil your appettite