Panthers top Devils in Jersey

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02/11/2012 - Newark, NJ (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - The New Jersey Devils surely won't miss seeing Florida's Kris Versteeg for the rest of the season.

Versteeg put the Panthers ahead in the second period with his fifth goal in four meetings against New Jersey this season, sending Florida to a 3-1 win over the Devils at the Prudential Center.

Former Devils backup goaltender Scott Clemmensen got the better of his former teammate, Martin Brodeur, stopping 27 shots in Florida's second straight win. Mikael Samuelsson added an empty-net goal in the victory.

Brodeur, returning after a one-game absence because of an ankle injury, turned aside 17 shots in New Jersey's second straight loss and first regulation defeat in eight games (5-1-2). Steve Bernier scored the lone goal for the Devils.

Versteeg gave the Panthers a 2-1 lead at 7:43 of the second period after New Jersey twice failed to clear its own zone.

The Panthers managed to keep the puck in and Stephen Weiss' shot from the top of the slot was deflected by a New Jersey defender. The puck went directly to Versteeg, who snapped a shot from the left circle past Brodeur for his 21st goal of the season.

"It wasn't anything they did... we started to throw the puck away," said New Jersey captain Zach Parise. "It's frustrating because we've been playing really well of late. It wasn't a great effort by us."

Versteeg finished the season series with five goals and one assist. Clemmensen also continued to haunt his old team, improving to 4-0 lifetime against the Devils. He stopped all nine shots he faced in the second period and seven more in the third.

The Devils failed to convert a late power play -- their only chance of the game -- and Samuelsson found the empty cage with 25 seconds remaining.

New Jersey grabbed the lead just 1:39 into the game when Bernier deflected the puck past Clemmensen. Dainius Zubrus intercepted a poor clearing pass along the right boards and sent pass toward the net. The puck first tipped the stick of Alexei Ponikarovsky before Bernier chipped it through the five-hole for his first goal as a Devil.

The Panthers tied it on a power play with 4:52 left in the opening period. Moments after Zubrus took a hooking penalty, Bergenheim deflected Erik Gudbranson's shot from just above the left circle past Brodeur for his 11th goal of the season.

"We came out well, the first 10 minutes," said Devils head coach Pete DeBoer. "We were playing our seventh game in [12] days and I think we ran out of little bit of gas."

Game Notes

The teams split the four-game season series, each winning once at home and on the road. It marked the third straight season-series split between the teams...Florida improved to 12-12-4 on the road this season...The Devils hadn't lost in regulation since a 4-1 setback against Philadelphia on January 21...Parise had a seven-game point streak stopped.

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Sportsbook Betting Lines

Who Makes the Sportsbook Betting Lines?

Las Vegas Sports Consultants (LVSC) is the world’s premier oddsmaking company and the most respected authority on making the lines. Mike Seba is a Senior Oddsmaker at LVSC and has been making lines for the last six years. In our extended interview, Seba explained that there are 4-5 oddsmakers assigned to make lines for each of the major sports (pro & college football and basketball; MLB, NHL, boxing, golf). Each of these oddsmakers bring unique opinions, strengths and weaknesses to the process. Oddsmakers at LVSC are professional sports junkies who love what they do and would probably do it for nothing if you asked them, but they do get paid for it. By necessity their approach is very research-oriented and concise, since with millions of dollars at risk there is little margin for error.

“You either have a passion for it or you don’t,” Seba said.

“The #1 thing for us is to make a line for each game that creates good two-way action. We do this by drawing from past experiences and applying them to current situations. People think it’s much more complicated, but it’s not. “

What are the Football Betting Lines Trying to Accomplish?

There is a common misconception that point spreads represent the oddsmakers’ prediction of how many points the favorite will win by. That is not the case at all – their intent is NOT to evenly split the ATS result between the teams; rather, their goal is to attract equal betting action on both sides. Stated another way, they want to create a line that half the people find appealing to bet one way while the other half find it appealing to bet the other way (known as ‘dividing the action’).

Divided action means the sportsbook is guaranteed a profit on the game because of the fee charged to the bettor (called juice or vig – typically $11 bet to win $10).

How the Opening Line Is Made

The opening line is the first line created by the oddsmakers, which is then sent out to sportsbooks. Of course there is an entire method to the madness on how the opening line is created. Seba explained that it all starts with each oddsmaker creating a line on each game based upon their own personal approach. This usually includes having up-to-date power ratings on each team.

Power ratings are the oddsmaker’s value of each team and are used as a guide to calculate a "preliminary" pointspread on an upcoming game. The power ratings are adjusted after each game a team plays. Examples of non-game factors that would require an adjustment to a team's power rating are key player injuries and player trades.

Once a game’s power rating based pointspread is determined, the oddsmaker will make adjustments to that line after considering each team's most recent games played and previous games played against that opponent. Also, adjustments are made after reading each team’s local newspapers to get a sense of what the coaches & players are thinking going into the game.

Since the oddsmaker’s ultimate goal is equally dividing the sports betting action, public perception and sportsbook betting patterns must be taken into account. For example, the public might have heavy betting interest week after week on a popular college football betting team such as USC. If an oddsmaker comes up with a preliminary line of USC -7, then an adjustment up to -7.5 or -8 would be made in response to the public’s expected USC bias.

The last step in the line-making process for each oddsmaker is taking one final look to determine whether or not the line "feels right." This is where common sense and past experience with how games are bet enters into the picture.

A round-table discussion among the 4-5 oddsmakers involved in making the line for each sport is then conducted and a consensus line is decided upon by the Odds Director before it is released to the sportsbooks. Of the 4-5 oddsmakers, generally the 2 most respected opinions are weighed more heavily by the Odds Director before he decides on the final line.

Why Sports Betting Lines Change

Once the opening line is released by LVSC, the individual sportsbooks decide if they want to make any adjustments before offering it to the public. Reasons for such adjustments include:

Experts working for the individual books having a strong opinion on the game

Individual books having players who consistently bet with certain tendencies (such as an extreme bias toward favorites or toward a certain popular team like USC)

The purpose of these adjustments, like all line adjustments, is to more equally divide the betting action.

Once betting begins, sportsbooks can adjust the line at any time. In doing so they attempt to make more attractive the team that is getting less action. By moving the line, sportsbooks can influence how the public bets on a particular game.

For example, if the pointspread on a game is 7 and most of the money is coming in on the underdog (taking the +7), sportsbooks will then move the number down to 6 ½ to try and attract money on the favorite.

Moving the line is the oddsmaker's effort to balance betting action, and often times such moves can have a major impact on a bettor’s decision. Oddsmakers can also change the line depending on various event-related factors such as player injuries or weather. Obviously, if the line comes out a week ahead of the event (which is the case in football), there is much that could happen during the week leading up to the event that could affect the line. Oddsmakers have to determine if any changes are necessary and send out an "adjusted line."

“The main objective is that our clients get equal action on both sides,” Seba said. “We’re not trying to pick the team that covers the spread, we’re trying to make it a coin flip, a tough decision (for the bettor). If we’ve done that, we’ve done our job.”

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