An impressive 86-77 win at Orlando on Christmas Day without Paul Pierce(notes) improved the Celtics to 13-1 on the road, but they found a pair of unexpected hurdles on the West Coast leg of their trip.
After blowing a three-point lead in the final 10 seconds and losing 92-90 on a buzzer-beater to the Los Angeles Clippers on Sunday night, the Celtics coughed up a 16-point first-quarter lead in a 103-99 defeat to lowly Golden State on Monday.
I believe that Boston is going to suffer another "letdown" this evening, following a very similar pattern to their road swing at this time last year; Boston is just 2-5 ATS its last seven overall and just 2-4 ATS is last six on the road.
On the other side of the court: Before facing the Los Angeles Lakers on Monday night, Phoenix (20-12) had lost three of four, including its first two home defeats. But the Suns erased any bad feelings with a 118-103 win over the reigning NBA champions.
Alvin Gentry had been upset after the Suns allowed a season-high in points in a 132-127 loss at Golden State on Saturday, but his team held the Lakers to 43.5 % shooting.
Remember, Phoenix always plays tough in front of the home town crowd; 4-2 ATS its last six at the US Airways Center.
Bottom line: No need to overanalyze this one; Phoenix has the home-court advantage and is coming off a big victory while the Celtics are a road-weary and injury riddled team that desperately needs to get back to friendly confines to regroup; look for PHOENIX to move to 8-5 ATS this season in non-conference games and for Boston to fall to 1-6 ATS this year off an upset loss as a favorite!
don't overbet the suns, no garnet tonight has caused the line to move to suns -4.5 ....... I could see the suns winning but not covering a spread of 5 points. The celtics are still a tough defensive team even without garnett and pierce, and rondo (fyi being bothered by a hamstring) is a handfull of gaurds in the leauge that could give nash alot of trouble on the defensive end.....
Nick "BookieKiller" Parsons 12/30
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