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Pens host Thrashers in key matinee battleHockey Betting Lines04/03/2010 - (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The Penguins weren't very impressive the last time they took the ice. Luckily for them, they face a Thrashers team Saturday afternoon that they should to be able to snap out of their current funk against given recent history. Pittsburgh, still in the hunt for its second Atlantic Division title in three seasons, seeks an eighth win in a row over Atlanta in a matinee meeting at Mellon Arena. The Penguins are 2-2-2 over their last six games and 4-4-3 in their past 11. They enter Saturday tied with New Jersey for first place in the division with five games to play. The Devils play tonight at Carolina. Having already clinched a playoff spot, the defending champs looked out of sync on Wednesday in a 2-0 setback to the Lightning. Pittsburgh was shut out for the first time since Dec. 30 and failed to score on four chances with the man advantage, including a five-minute power play in the first period. Head coach Dan Bylsma was so displeased with the effort that he turned a scheduled off day on Thursday into an 8:30 a.m. (et) practice. "I don't think that we were focused and prepared to play our game," Bylsma told Pittsburgh's Web site on Thursday. "That's an area that we need to get better at. You have to get better and address your team in certain areas, and it needed to be done." Marc-Andre Fleury made 15 saves for Pittsburgh, which was without Evgeni Malkin for a fifth straight game and for the seventh time in eight contests due to a bruised foot. Defenseman Sergei Gonchar missed his fourth game in a row thanks to illness and both players are again questionable for tonight but did practice in full on Thursday. Captain Sidney Crosby has seemed to miss Malkin as of late, as he has gone without a goal in eight of his last nine games. Crosby still leads the NHL with a career-best 47 goals. Pittsburgh is 2-1-0 on a six-game homestand, the final residency at Mellon Arena, which will be replaced as the Pens' home venue next season by Consol Energy Center. The Penguins would like to make sure the Thrashers' last regular-season visit to the arena is one to forget. Pittsburgh hasn't lost to Atlanta since a 4-1 road setback on Jan. 30, 2008, and hasn't dropped a game at home to the Thrashers since a 4-2 loss on Dec. 27, 2006, winning six straight at Mellon Arena over Atlanta since. The Thrashers and Pens wrap their regular-season series against each other on April 10 in Atlanta. If they are to meet after that, it could be in the first round of the playoffs. The Thrashers are currently two points back of a postseason spot in the Eastern Conference with four games to play. The Thrashers do not own a favorable schedule down the stretch. They missed an opportunity to best the East's top seed on Thursday, falling to Washington by a 2-1 margin. After visiting Pittsburgh today, Atlanta hosts New Jersey and then visits Washington before its finale against the Pens. Tim Stapleton had the Thrashers' lone goal on Thursday and Ondrej Pavelec made 22 saves for Atlanta, which had a three-game road winning streak halted and lost four of its last six. "We just weren't able to get that next one," Thrashers forward Colby Armstrong said. "That's a big difference right now, finding ways to win." Pavel Kubina is second among Atlanta defenseman with 38 points, but missed the last game because of an upper-body injury that has him day-to-day. While Kubina could miss this contest as well, Evander Kane could return from a broken left foot that has caused the fourth pick of the 2009 draft to miss the last 15 games. Kane has 14 goals and 25 points this season.
<< Heat take winning streak into Minnesota
(Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The Miami Heat will try to push their season-high winning streak to eight games and clinch a playoff spot tonight, when they close out a three-game road trip against the Minnesota Timberwolves at the Target Center. Miami
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Streaking Sens visit Islanders >>
(Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The playoff-bound Ottawa Senators will try to record their seventh victory in a row this afternoon against the New York Islanders at Nassau Coliseum. The Senators stretched their current win streak to six games with Thursd
Red Wings welcome Preds for important West clash >>
Sliding Devils kick off road trip in Raleigh >>
Rangers continue playoff push in Florida >>
Bruins try to rebound in Toronto >>
2007 online football betting PreviewMy 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. 2007 College Football Betting PreviewThere 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. Las Vegas Sports LinesThe 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. To visit this sportsbook got to MySportsbook.com for all your football betting needs. Mysportsbook.com online sportsbook accepts Visa and Mastercard credit cards. |
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