Since the NBA likes to take forever to play the games, this series won’t even begin until Monday, May 17th. The Lakers are more than a 3-1 favorite in basketball betting odds to win the series against the Suns.Basketball playoffs betting odds list the Lakers as a 6.5 point favorite on Monday with a total of 211.5. The Suns are coming off a series win over San Antonio while the Lakers swept away the Utah Jazz in four straight. The series between Los Angeles and Phoenix should be interesting with some great matchups. The Lakers have Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol while the Suns have Steve Nash and Amare Stoudemire. “They’re a great combo,” Los Angeles head coach Phil Jackson said about Nash and Stoudemire. “But we have a pretty good combo and Kobe and Pau, so we’ll try to match them.”
Even though the Lakers are the defending NBA champs, they may be playing with a little revenge since it was Phoenix who knocked them out of the playoffs in 2006 and 2007. Both teams will have almost a week off so they have time to heal. Kobe is looking as healthy as he has all season while the week off should help Steve Nash who had a swollen eye. The Suns are definitely playing as well as they have all season. “We played them this year and I think they’re better now,” the Lakers Ron Artest said, “So we’ve got to come with our ‘A’ effort. We have a whole week to prepare, so that’s great.”
The matchup between the Suns and Lakers in basketball playoffs betting has the best 3-point shooting team in Phoenix (41.2 percent) against the top 3-point defense in the Lakers (32.8 percent allowed). The best player in the series is likely to be Kobe Bryant. He averaged 27.5 points in the regular season against Phoenix, shooting 54.4 percent from the field.
The Lakers won three of the four regular season meetings against the Suns this season. Los Angeles blew out the Suns in Los Angeles, winning 108-88 and 121-102 in basketball betting. The teams split the two games in Phoenix. The total was 50-50 as two of the four games went under while two games went over the total.