Expert NBA Free Pick: Boston Celtics vs. Phoenix Suns

The C’s were able to survive the trip to the Rose Garden on Thursday night, as they toppled the Portland Trail Blazers 88-78 in an ugly game that featured a ton of sloppy play. There were six double digit point scorers on the night for the Celtics, but none really played that great of a game, save Kevin Garnett, who came up one board and one assist shy of a triple double. It was great to see Kendrick Perkins in the fold once again for Boston, as he missed the first half of the season with a knee injury. This is going to be just his third game back, and will be his first back to back performance of the campaign as well. He put up 10 points and nine rebounds off the bench last night. Shaquille O’Neal sat out last night as well, and he could be back in the lineup with his hip injury on Friday night if need be. Boston is really starting to round into an incredibly deep team, as Head Coach Doc Rivers already has eight players or so on his active roster and three more on his bench that he has no fear in relying on regularly.

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The Suns are really starting to reach a crossroad in their season, and maybe in their franchise’s history as well. If they don’t perform well in the final four games of this five game home stand, they are likely to be big time sellers at the NBA’s trade deadline, which doesn’t loom all that far in the future. Phoenix lost its third straight game 114-107 to the Charlotte Bobcats to start this home stand off, and this skid really put the Suns in a position where they are going to have to scratch and claw to get back to the .500 mark. Defensively, this team is a wreck. Sure, there was a 75-74 loss to the Detroit Pistons thrown in there, but these other three losses since January 11th have featured allowing 114, 105, and 132 points. There’s a reason that Phoenix ranks No. 29 in the league at 107.9 points per game allowed. Steve Nash has to want to prod his eyes out watching this team, as he is doing everything he can with 17.3 points and 11.0 assists per game, but it just isn’t translating into victories.

For some reason though, we tend to believe that the skid ends tonight for Phoenix. Boston has to be exhausted after the short turnaround from Portland last night, as this trip is a lot longer than you would probably expect. The Suns can force the C’s to run, and if they can do that, they should excel with the upset on the NBA odds on Friday night.