The Lakers are as short as 10/23 to beat the Celtics tonight

The Boston Celtics will be in Los Angeles on Thursday night to try to take game 1 off of the Los Angeles Lakers in the 2010 NBA Finals.  Los Angeles is not a great place to be if you are a road team playing a game 1 as the Lakers have been dominant in opening series at home with a victory.  Besides their win against Phoenix in game 1 of the Western Conference finals, the Lakers have won an additional 9 game 1s at home consecutively to compile a 10 game winning streak for game 1 home games:

2010 Second round: beat Utah in game 1, 104-99.
2010 First round: beat OKC in game 1, 87-79.

2009 NBA Finals: beat Orlando in game 1, 100-75.
2009 Western Conference finals: beat Denver in game 1, 105-103.
2009 Second round: beat Houston Rockets in game 1, 100-92.
2009 First round: beat Utah in game 1, 113-100.

2008 Western Conference finals: beat San Antonio in game 1, 89-85.
2008 Second round: beat Utah in game 1, 109-98
2008 First round: beat Denver in game 1, 128-114

The Lakers have lost game 1s ON THE ROAD since 2004, including a game 1 loss IN BOSTON in the 2008 NBA Finals, but Los Angeles have been perfect when opening their series from home since losing game 1 of the 2004 NBA finals to the Detroit Pistons.

That streak does imply that odds of -230 (10/23) have value, the odds on Los Angeles winning game 1 with Players Only.

However our recommendation is to bet against the streak and to take Boston to win game 1 at +190 instead.  The Celtics are a veteran laden team that has hit their stride and playing at the sold out Staples Center will not phase Boston.

Also Boston have already slain bigger giants on the road this post-season than Los Angeles and the the Celtics had to win road games against both Cleveland and Orlando, two teams that had better regular season winning percentages than the Lakers.

+190 are good odds on Ray Allen and crew and that is our recommended bet for the first game of the series.

Register with Players Only to bet on the 2010 NBA finals - take advantage of their 10% deposit bonus to receive free bets that can be used on MVP propositions.