What bettors need to know: Phoenix at San Antonio - 03-07-2009 What bettors need to know: Phoenix at San Antonio
By Matt Severance
Phoenix Suns at San Antonio Spurs (-7, 225)
Season series
The Suns beat the Spurs on opening night of the season but have lost two in a row to San Antonio since. Phoenix has lost the first three games on its current four-game road trip and four in a row on the road overall (1-3 ATS). It's the Suns' first three-game skid since January and they’ve allowed an average of nearly 121 points in the stretch. The Suns haven't allowed less than 100 since Feb. 8 at Detroit (the total has gone over in nine of the 13 games since that Pistons outing).
San Antonio enters off a 100-78 win over Washington on Friday in which Tim Duncan scored a season-low five points, but he didn't play at all in the fourth quarter (and just more than 18 minutes overall) because he was needed.
The Spurs have topped 100 points in just one of the three games against Phoenix this season, although these two have yet to play since Alvin Gentry took over as Phoenix coach and reinstalled the running style for the Suns.
After San Antonio scored 114 in a 10-point win over Phoenix on Jan. 29, Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said: "We're scoring way too many points. We shouldn't be having this much fun."
That quote probably has made its way to the Phoenix locker room.
The underdog, by the way, has covered in eight of the past 11 meetings in this series.
Who is missing?
Phoenix forward Amare Stoudemire is out for the season with news coming down late this week that he won't be able to return for the playoffs because of his injured eye. Stoudemire led Phoenix in scoring in each of the three previous meetings with San Antonio this year.
San Antonio won't have Manu Ginobili, who hasn't played since Feb. 11 with an injured ankle. He is expected to return by the middle of the month. Ginobili averaged 20.5 points and 6.5 assists in two games against Phoenix this year, missing the lone Spurs loss to the Suns. He was 18-for-18 from the foul line in the last meeting with Phoenix. The Spurs are 11-10 ATS without him this season, but 6-3 ATS during this recent absence.
Newly acquired forward Drew Gooden didn't play in San Antonio's win Friday against the Wizards and is not expected to suit up against Phoenix. Popovich said he wants to give Gooden about a week to make sure Gooden's troublesome groin injury was healed.
“We want to make sure he’s in shape and solid that way,” Popovich said to reporters.
Suns sticking with lineup
Matt Barnes has been very solid since being inserted into the Suns' starting lineup at power forward with Stoudemire out. Barnes had 17 points and nine rebounds in Friday's loss to the Rockets. Gentry put Barnes at power forward, moved Grant Hill to small forward and Leandro Barbosa back to a sixth-man role after a 26-point loss to the Lakers on Feb. 26. While Phoenix is just 2-3 since then, Barnes has averaged 17 points and 6.6 rebounds in those five games.
Gentry told the Arizona Republic that he will stick with that lineup from here on out, but mainly because of Hill.
"Grant needs to be out on the (open) floor," Gentry said. "He struggled at the four for us because he's not used to setting drags and stuff. We have to try to keep him at the three.”
Hill, incidentally, had one of the worst games of his career Friday in Houston, going scoreless with just one assist in 25 minutes.