posted January 31, 2008 at 15:36 in NBA Betting Trends

The first of TNT’s offerings tonight finds the (31-13) Dallas Mavericks taking on the NBA’s best (35-8) Boston Celtics in a game that’s been circled on both teams calendars for quite some time. The Mavericks currently sit a half game in back of the New Orleans Hornets for Southwest Division supremacy, while the Celtics boast the best record in the league and hold an 11-game lead over the Toronto Raptors in the Atlantic Division. Dallas has been outstanding at home this year (20-3), but they’ve been very beatable on the road coming into tonight’s clash with an 11-10 SU road record. They also treated their backers poorly when playing the role of visitor only covering 9 of their 21 overall games. The Celtics at one point had been pointspread

Gold at home, but they now only sport a winning mark at 13-10 ATS.

The Mavs were last in action on Tuesday night when they went into Memphis and handed the Grizzlies a 103-84 defeat. They covered the 5.5-point spread with ease and it was the second game in a row that they held their opponent to 80+ points. The Mavs have turned their play up a couple notches winning 8 of their L/10 overall games, but they’ve only managed a 4-6 ATS mark during that stretch. The Mavericks have made minced meat out of the Celtics the L/10 times they’ve squared off by winning nine of those contests. They’re 9-4-1 ATS the L/14 times they’ve faced each other, and that number includes their 5-2 ATS mark their L/7 trips to Boston.

The Celtics last took the court without the services of both Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen, but still managed a road win and cover as they bludgeoned the woeful Miami Heat 117-87. Tony Allen, Rajon Rondo, Leon Powe, and Eddie House all registered 20+ points in the win. Boston’s alternated wins their L/4 games, but they come into this contest winners in 6 of their L/10 overall with a 5-5 ATS mark. Boston hasn’t had much success against Dirk and the Mavs of late, but this is a much different looking Celtics squad than the ones Dallas faced in the past.

Vegas tagged the Celtics short 1-point home chalks in this spot with the ‘Total’ set at 184.5. Once the line was posted, bettors immediately bought into the Celtics raising the game line to 2.5-points. They also foresee a higher scoring contest since the ‘Total’ has inflated to its current number of 186. You can find both of those numbers currently at BetUS.com.

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