Allen's OT goal leads Florida over San Jose

Hockey Betting Lines

03/13/2010 - San Jose, CA (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Bryan Allen scored at the 2:46 mark of overtime to give the Florida Panthers a 3-2 win over the San Jose Sharks at HP Pavilion.

In the extra season, a left circle faceoff was won by Shawn Matthias and he drew it back to Allen, who threw a simple wrister on net that snuck through a screen set up by Matthias in front.

Allen and Matthias each finished the game with a goal and an assist while Keith Ballard scored the other goal for the Panthers, who have won four of their last five. Tomas Vokoun made 37 saves in the win.

The win gives Florida 66 points on the season as the team sits six points back of Boston for the final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference.

Patrick Marleau and Ryane Clowe each had a goal and an assist for the Sharks, who had their three-game winning streak snapped. Thomas Greiss stopped 25 shots in the loss.

San Jose has 96 points and sits three ahead of Chicago for the top spot in the Western Conference and is just three points behind Washington for first overall in the NHL.

The Sharks got on the board 5:32 into the first as Clowe skated with the puck from the right boards to the slot and snapped a wrister into the right corner.

Skating on the power play later in the first, San Jose took a 2-0 lead as Marleau's one-timer from a sharp angle at the right side found the back of the net for his 41st goal of the season with 2:15 left in the frame.

Just 1:02 into the second period, Florida found the scoreboard as Radek Dvorak took the puck from the deep left boards around to the outside left circle and fired a pass over to Ballard, who one-timed the puck into the open net.

Florida tied the game 5:01 into the final frame as Allen threw a shot on net from the left point that was stopped, but Matthias was there to backhand in the rebound from in front for his sixth goal of the year.

Game Notes

San Jose hits the road for six games starting in Anaheim on Sunday...Florida hosts Washington on Tuesday...Florida snapped a four-game losing streak in San Jose...San Jose went 1-for-2 on the power play while Florida failed to score on any of its three chances.

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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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