Stanford shocks third-ranked UCLA

NCAA Basketball Betting Lines

01/29/2007 - Palo Alto, CA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Lawrence Hill netted 22 points and pulled down five rebounds to help the Stanford Cardinal upset the third-ranked UCLA Bruins, 75-68, in a Pac-10 battle at Maples Pavilion.

Anthony Goods added 20 points while Brook Lopez had seven points and eight rebounds for the Cardinal (14-5, 6-3 Pac-10), who have won their last three contests.

Arron Afflalo netted 22 points, six rebounds and five assists while Darren Collison added 17 points and five steals for the Bruins (18-2, 7-2), who were riding a four-game winning streak coming into the contest.

The Bruins had a 12-point lead to start the second half, but Stanford rallied to take control of the game.

Trailing by a score of 45-35 the Cardinal slowly chipped away at the UCLA lead and grabbed the lead with a huge 18-2 run.

Goods got the burst started with a three-pointer at the 10:40 mark and Hill tied the game on a jumper and gave his team a 54-51 lead when he followed with a trey with 7:32 remaining.

Stanford increased its lead to eight a little later, but UCLA cut its deficit to six points on a three-pointer by Collison to make it a 65-59 game with under four minutes left.

The Cardinal continued to hold the lead, but the Bruins cut their deficit to 73-68 game on a layup by Alfred Aboya.

Goods, however, hit two free throws and Stanford held on for the victory.

The Bruins opened the game with a 9-2 run capped by Lorenzo Mata's jumper less than three minutes in.

Stanford made it a three-point game thanks to a jumper by Hill a bit over nine minutes in to make it a 15-12 contest.

UCLA, however, responded with a 13-4 run, with Afflalo contributing seven points, and had a 28-16 advantage on Russell Westbrook's dunk with 6:12 left in the first half.

The Bruins eventually took a 37-25 lead into the locker room.

Game Notes

UCLA leads the series, 126-89...UCLA's Josh Shipp had nine points, five assists and six steals...Stanford shot 46 percent while UCLA connected on 43 percent of its shots.

Jazzsorts NCAA Basketball Betting News

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SPORTS BETTING - Tennis is an underrated and under-utilized bettors' sport.

Ten years ago, at just about this time, I called Alan Boston in Vegas and left him a voicemail that went something like this (abridged version): "Hey Alan, Chad Millman from ESPN The Magazine calling. I want to do a book about wise guys, you in?"

A couple weeks later I got a message back (abridged version): "I don't know, maybe," Boston said. "Call me and we'll talk about it. But not later today. I got $1,000 on Andre Agassi to win the French Open at 40-1, and he's in the finals."

Here's what happened next (abridged version): Agassi won his tourney. Boston won his $40,000. I wrote sportsbook.

In the ten years since, how much has been wagered on the big-time tennis events? Put it this way: The Nevada Gaming Commission doesn't even track the number year by year because it's so small.

"Tennis makes up about one-tenth of one percent of our take," says Lucky's bookmaking boss Jimmy Vaccaro. "The last big golf major we probably had $100,000 worth of bets. In tennis, we might have written two big tickets."

Tennis' lack of popularity amongst the American bettoratti is no surprise, really. For starters, the biggest sports betting holidays -- the Super Bowl, the NCAA tourney -- are must see TV. People, at least the degenerates I know, plan vacations around watching those events in Vegas sports books.

But Wimbledon? Doesn't exactly reel in the whales. "Seriously, it's the nuts as an event," says Boston. "But who even knows when it's on?"

Here's another reason that helps explain why golf gets traction, something I call "The Bubbe Theory." My Bubbe is pushing 95 and has cataracts so bad that, to her, even the most crystalline Chicago day is mostly cloudy. But she still listens to the Cubs games, and she still calls me in a fit if she disagrees with something Rick Telander writes in the Chicago Sun Times. She's a sports fan. If she doesn't know you, you're just filling a niche. And niche players, even historically good ones like Roger and Raf, don't drive betting volume. Only the highest profile names attract square money, which inflates wagering totals like a shot of saline to the lips. Bubbe, and the public, loved Agassi, tennis' last cross-the-rubicon, mainstream draw. She also has a crush on Tiger. She's given me standing orders to put a sawbuck on the big cat whenever I walk through a sports book (or mistakenly tap into one via my Internet machine.) That explains why the Masters is getting $100K in action at some books while the four tennis majors might not get that combined this year.

This isn't a case of tennis being a difficult sport to bet. In fact, in Europe, it's probably the second most popular sport for gambling after soccer. Granted, as the WSJ football betting last week and The Mag's Shaun Assael examined in even greater depth last year, that might be because gamblers across the pond see it as an easy game to fix. But it could also be because, over there it holds the kind of sway the big two do over here.

Street corners in Spain are peppered with public courts and kids doing their best Raffy impressions. In some war torn parts of Eastern Europe poverty-stricken kids view tennis as an escape route, like football or basketball here. A couple years ago The Mag's Lindsay Berra wrote a great piece about Belgrade's Jelena Jankovic, Ana Ivanovic and Novak Djokovic. They learned the game as kids while bombs were raining down on their homeland. They practiced in drained swimming pools. Not exactly Nick Bolletierri conditions.

In the United States, casual fans think tennis is played four times a year. But on the tightly packed European continent, national interest in homegrown talent runs deep every weekend. Of the ATP's current top 20 players, only two, tennis betting and James Blake, are American. Fourteen are from Europe, representing six different countries.

No wonder fans from Lisbon to Bhudapest get jacked up for the net game, whether it's Wimbledon or a low-level tourney like the Estoril Open in Portugal (congrats to Spain's Albert Montanes for winning that one, btw). Chances are good that someone representing their flag will not only be playing, but have a shot at winning.

And that's all any bettor can ask for.

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