Bobcats knock off road-weary Warriors

Basketball Betting Lines

03/06/2010 - Charlotte, NC (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - D.J. Augustin scored 19 points off the bench, as the Charlotte Bobcats took down the Golden State Warriors, 101-90, at Time Warner Cable Arena.

Gerald Wallace added 18 points and 10 rebounds for the Bobcats, who have won the first two games of their three-game homsetand that ends Tuesday against the Heat.

Boris Diaw donated 14 points and 12 boards. Stephen Jackson and Theo Ratliff chipped in 12 and 11 points, respectively, for Charlotte, which shot 46 percent from the field.

Stephen Curry finished with 25 points for the Warriors, who fell to 0-4 on their five-game road trip that concludes Monday versus the Hornets. Corey Maggette added 19 points, while Anthony Morrow had 11 points for Golden State, which made 38.2 percent of its shots.

Ahead 86-85 midway through the fourth, the Bobcats went on a 15-2 run to claim victory.

After Chris Hunter's tip-in cut the gap to 94-87 for the Warriors, Jackson made a jumper and Augustin drained a three-pointer to extend Charlotte's lead to 99-87 with three minutes to play.

Diaw then capped the burst with a layup to put the Bobcats ahead 101-87 with a minute remaining.

The Bobcats scored the final six points of the first quarter to take a 24-19 lead after 12 minutes.

Golden State surged ahead in the second and led for a majority of the period before taking a 54-53 margin into the locker room.

The third was a closely contested frame that ended with Augustin's three-point play, giving Charlotte an 81-76 lead.

Game Notes

The Warriors have lost a season-high 10 straight road games...Charlotte outrebounded Golden State, 60-36...The Bobcats had 20 turnovers, leading to 23 Golden State points...Warriors leading scorer Monta Ellis (back) missed his fifth straight game, and center Andris Biedrins (groin) sat out his fourth consecutive contest.

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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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