Siena captures third straight MAAC title
NCAA Basketball Betting Lines
03/08/2010 - Albany, NY (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Edwin Ubiles recorded a game-high 27 points along with seven rebounds to help the Siena Saints past the Fairfield Stags in overtime, 72-65, to win the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference Tournament Championship.
Alex Franklin and Ryan Rossiter had double-doubles as Franklin scored 22, Rossiter scored 10, and they both grabbed 12 rebounds for the Saints (27-6), who will head into the NCAA Tournament having won their last five games.
This will mark Siena's third consecutive trip to the NCAA Tournament and third straight MAAC Tournament title.
Derek Needham led Fairfield (22-10) with 16 points as Anthony Johnson added 14 and 13 rebounds. The Stags were looking for their fifth tournament crown.
In the extra period, Siena took a four-point lead at 64-60 after a Franklin and Rossiter bucket, with Rossiter's bucket coming with 3:44 left. Fairfield got within two at 64-62, but was unable to recapture the lead as the Saints scored six straight to extend the advantage to 70-64, including two Ubiles free throws with 30 seconds remaining to cement the win.
"What we didn't do is panic when we had our ears pinned back," said Sienna coach Frank McCaffery. "We got back into it at the end of the first half. Our goal obviously in the second half was to try and disrupt their rhythm."
Down 11 at halftime, Siena fought back to tie the game at 53 with 7:46 to go and took its first lead since early in the game on a Ronald Moore three- pointer with 2:07 remaining. Siena had a 60-58 edge at that point, but Fairfield's Colin Nickerson converted on a fastbreak layup with 55 second left to tie the game at 60-60.
"I thought we had some costly turnovers when I thought we controlled the whole first half," Fairfield coach Ed Cooley said. "I thought we had three, or four or five straight turnovers that led to runouts. Really, that was the game."
With the game tied at 11, Fairfield mounted a 21-8 run that gave the Stags a 32-19 lead with 6:30 left in the opening half. Siena then scored five straight, but couldn't get within 10 as Fairfield went into halftime leading 39-28.
Game Notes
Siena has won 38 straight games at home...Siena shot 44.1 percent over the course of the game while Fairfield made 41.5 percent of its shots.
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Football Betting Sportsbook Accepts Credit Cards
Michael Vick is back, Brett Favre isn't and the NFC East remains the best division in the NFC, maybe in all of football.
As players start to gather for the start of another season, some things change and some stay the same in the world of the NFL.
The NFC East has been the dominant division in the National Conference for a while, despite limited playoff success, save for the New York Giants surprise Super Bowl win two seasons ago.
Hell, there's a generation of kids in Texas who have never seen the Cowboys win a playoff game (last win was in 1996).
But collectively, the Giants, Eagles, Cowboys and Redskins (well, maybe not so much the Redskins) are as good as a division gets in an NFC conference that has struggled to stay competitive with the AFC side.
Sports bettors have both acknowledged the NFC East's dominance, as one glance at the NFL future odds menu will show.
Looking over the NFL betting odds at online sports book MySportsbook.com we see the top three teams listed to win the NFC Championship are all from the NFC East:
Dallas Cowboys - 7 - 1
Philadelphia Eagles - 13 - 2
New York Giants - 9 - 2
Slotting in behind these three are two teams from the NFC North: the Minnesota Vikings (15-2) and the Chicago Bears (10-1).
Again, despite the lack of recent playoff success, the Dallas Cowboys are popular with the sports betting community, as they hold 14% of all the money wagered on who will win the NFC Championship.
So far, the New York Giants are the bettors' favorite to represent their conference in the Super Bowl, as they have 24% of the overall NFC Championship betting volume.
And what about the Philadelphia Eagles? For the most part, the Eagles had a very productive offseason, the kind that could bring them back to the top.
They had a good draft adding the likes of WR Jeremy Maclin and RB LeSean McCoy.
Unfortunately, the team received a blow when long-time defensive coordinator Jim Johnson passed away on Tuesday.
But this team will make a real run at the division title this year. Going into the regular season, Philly is listed at +240 to win the division.
Last season the Eagles were 9-6-1 SU and 10-6 ATS.
Teams from the NFC East will play teams from the AFC West in the regular season and the Eagles haven't really been a good bet in the last 20 games against the likes of San Diego, Oakland, K.C. and Denver, only going 8-12 ATS.
Two seasons removed from that Super Bowl title, the New York Giants see themselves listed as the odds-on favorite in NFC East championship futures at +162.
Plaxico Burress is gone and with him all the bad publicity surrounding the gun in the sweatpants incident, but can they replace him in the offense?
Last season the Giants were a very reliable bet going 12-4 ATS.
In the Giants' last 20 games against fellow teams from the NFC East; they are 13-7 ATS.
Dallas is listed at +240 to win the division.
Dallas went 9-7 SU and 7-9 ATS last season and with the amount of talent the Cowboys have, a similar performance won't do.
The Cowboys have been atrocious against divisional rivals, going 6-14 ATS in their last 20.
The Washington Redskins are longshots to win the division at +550.
Visit MySportsbook.com for free sportsbook odds RSS feeds go to MySportsbook.com for all your betting football needs.