A mega-trade in the NBA today sends Jason Kidd to Dallas. We have to question to move for the Mavericks, the trade essentially boils down to Devin Harris for Kidd and Harris certainly has a lot of potential as he has emerged as one of the better point guards in the league. His shooting has greatly improved this year and Kidd will be a step back in the scoring department. Harris is a better defender as well although the Mavericks are banking on Kidd’s playoff experience to play a big role for Dallas. The Mavericks also give up draft picks and cash. Presumably the Nets will buy out the contract of Jerry Stackhouse and the Mavs can get him back but overall this trade could haunt the Mavericks as a sell-out one-year move unless it pays off with a championship.

It was nice to have big trade news today taking away some spotlight from the Clemens/McNamee saga in Washington. What did we find out? Both are hard to believe and both are probably inaccurate on some fronts. Obviously one of them is lying as there are major contradictions but why go through this whole costly, time-consuming process. As a baseball fan, I can’t wait for spring training to start so we have some other baseball news to talk about.

Taking an underdog and getting to overtime is usually a great thing right? Well in football it is, especially if you have an underdog of over a touchdown. Technically in the NFL you need to be getting at least six points and in the sometimes crazy college overtimes to truly be safe you need to be getting eight points. In basketball common sense would say that if after 40 minutes the game was tied, things should stay pretty close for just five more minutes. Well that is often not the case and our service knows it all too well in the last week or so.

A few games we’ve been on in the last ten days:

Florida State +10 over North Carolina – end of regulation: 67-67 – OT Final: 84-73 The game was close throughout and at no point in regulation were the Heels covering the huge spread but a 17-6 edge in OT led to the narrow cover as FSU's upset bid fell flat.

Iowa State +6.5 over Texas – end of regulation: 62-62 – OT Final: 71-65 Fortunately most of our customers still won this game but the line did fall to +6 in many places later in the day. Iowa State dominated in regulation, leading by double-digits for much of the game but went ice cold late and in OT. A 3-point shot by Diante Garrett with just eleven seconds left in overtime saved us from a painful loss.

Clemson +9.5 over North Carolina – end of regulation: 82-82 – Double OT Final: 103-93 Clemson led the game from start to finish and at no point did the Heels take lead in regulation only managing to tie the game in the final minute of play, erasing a 15-point second half deficit. A back-and-forth OT period didn’t solve things but Clemson was outscored 13-3 in the second session, sealing the cover with free throws.

UW-Milwaukee +6 over Butler – end of regulation: 67-67 – OT Final: 83-75 The Panthers stormed out to a big lead in the first half before fighting though a close second half. Butler took its biggest lead of regulation late by just three-points but Ricky Franklin made an off-balance 3-pointer with just a second left on the clock for UW-M. A miss and we have a winner, but in overtime Butler took over to win by eight nailing free throws.

In reality it is not that surprising that the favored team ends up winning as an underdog runs out of gas after playing a great game against a tough opponent. Still it is very frustrating knowing that one free throw in regulation by either team would have sealed up an easy victory. That said, we’ve certainly been on the other end of things at times and it is good to know that we are making the right calls in handicapping the match-ups even if the final score ends up as a loss. We’ve had a great run of picks in the last ten days, and we very were close to having a simply incredible run with these close games that probably should have been wins counting as losses.