NBA betting odds favor Phoenix on Monday in Game 5 as they host the Portland Trail Blazers. Just because the Suns are favored doesn’t mean they will win though as the Blazers showed in Game 1 of this series. They shocked the Suns 105-100 as 8.5 point basketball betting underdogs in the first game in Phoenix.
NBA betting trends normally point to the Suns at home so the Game 1 win by Portland was a huge surprise. The Blazers normally have all kinds of trouble on the road and they rarely win at Phoenix. Getting another road win at Phoenix would be a surprise but the Blazers have already shown it can be done. The Suns need a great effort out of Amare Stoudemire and a big game out of Steve Nash if they are to win this series.
What is surprising about Portland is that they had more success on the road vs. the NBA betting odds than they did at home. Normally you could just pencil in the Blazers for a winning home record vs. the point spread and a losing record on the road. That was not the case this season. Portland was 25-15-1 on the road this season vs. the number. Even without Brandon Roy the Blazers are capable of winning on the road. Portland was a team that went over the total on the road as 24 of their 41 road games during the regular season went over. That is a surprise since the Blazers were the third best defensive team in the NBA this season. And their offense was not that great at just 21st in the league.
Phoenix was supposed to roll in this series against a Portland team without Brandon Roy but so much for that idea. The Suns are proving once again that their style of play is better suited for the regular season than for the playoffs. The Suns had the top ranked offense in the league but their defense was terrible. In the playoffs it is defense that wins and the Suns are finding that out again. Even though the Suns had the best offense in the league they went under the total more often than they went over. The oddsmakers are starting to adjust though as in Game 1 the teams combined to score only 206 points which was right on the basketball betting number.