InSpin

Bruins -200 vs. Maple Leafs

Two ancient rivals renew their battle this Thursday when the Toronto Maple Leafs travel abroad to visit the Boston Bruins. The Bruins have lagged behind the success of their Beantown sports brethren. Six titles this decade for Boston have not included a Stanley Cup and the Bruins have not won the Cup since 1972.

This season has been more of the same for Boston as they have struggled to achieve their 2-1-3 record. The Bruins have hung tough in their losses, but have ultimately lost three of those contests in a shootout, including their last two games against Pittsburgh and in Buffalo. Boston has lost four of their last five, three of those coming in shootouts since starting the season 1-0 with a victory in the Pepsi Center over Colorado.

Toronto (1-2-3) has been in free full since their quality opening game victory over Detroit on the night the Red Wings raised their Stanley Cup championship banner. The Maple Leafs have dropped five straight since besting Detroit on October 9. Much like the Bruins, the Leafs have hung tough in many of their losses, with three of them going to a shootout. Toronto's troubles have a lot to do with the fact that they cannot score.  In their five losses, the Leafs have been held to one goal or less three times and are averaging only 1.83 goals per game this season and that average was greatly skewed by a four goal performance against the Blues on October 13. Their defense has not been much better giving up an average of 3.50 goals per game.

Boston has played a little better on offense and defense but it has not been able to allow them to win in regulation regularly. The Bruins' leading scorer is Marc Savard with his 9 points (5 goals, 4 assists). Boston's net minder Manny Fernandez boasts a stellar 2.62 goals against average.

Inspin.com

Sooners -20 vs. Jayhawks

With last week's fabulous Red River Shootout now in the history books with Oklahoma on the short end of the stick, the team looks to regroup this Saturday in Norman, Oklahoma. While their hopes of a perfect season were dashed at the hands of rival Texas 45-35, the Sooners (5-1, 1-1) still seem to hold their own destiny as they set their sites on a Big 12 Championship and the possibility of still achieving a spot in the BCS Championship game in January. After all two years ago, Texas nipped Oklahoma but the Sooners rebounded to claim the Big 12 crown and last season saw a two-loss LSU team clinch the national championship.

Pollsters took into account Oklahoma's loss to a top five team and only dropped the Sooners to number four. The Sooners will welcome another ranked team, number 16 Kansas for a second straight tough test, this time on the friendly grounds of Oklahoma Memorial Stadium.

There was no bigger surprise in 2007 than Kansas and they are continuing their success in 2009. The Jayhawks (5-1, 2-0) only blemish was a close loss to number 19 South Florida on September 12. Stalled in the middle of the top-25, a victory on the road in Norman will go along way to placing Kansas back into national title contention. This will be no easy feat though. In addition to coming off a tough loss to an arch-rival, Oklahoma has won 21 straight games at Memorial Stadium.

Kansas should be in for an aerial offensive attack by the nation's fourth ranking scoring offense.  The Sooners average an astounding 523 yards per game and 47 points per game. Last week Sam Bradford threw for 387 yards with five touchdowns on two interceptions. The onus was clearly on Bradford last week as Oklahoma's ground game sputtered to 48 yards on 23 attempts.

Kansas knows they must make hay on offense since the Sooner defense struggled so mightily last Saturday, giving up 438 yards. The Sooners will also be missing middle linebacker Ryan Reynolds who is gone for the season with a right knee ligament tear.

This is the teams' first meeting since 2005 when Oklahoma bested the Jayhawks 19-3 for their fourth straight win in the series. Kansas last beat Oklahoma in 1997.

InSpin.com

Vijay Singh +500

Sergio Garcia +800

Phil Mickelson +1000

OK, the PGA Tour’s FedEx Cup playoffs were a dud again this year.

That makes 0-for-2 in the drama department for the Tour’s postseason system that debuted in 2007. Last year, Tiger Woods had the FedEx Cup’s $10 million prize basically wrapped up by the time the Tour Championship rolled around. Most people expected a wide-open race in 2008 with Tiger sidelined by injury, but Vijay Singh put on a Tiger-esque performance by winning the first two playoff tournaments and only needs to not get disqualified this week to win the FedEx Cup.

So even though Singh technically has nothing to play for this week, you still have to count the hard-working Fijian as the favorite this week. He never takes a tournament off or for granted. No wonder Singh is the +450 WagerWeb.com favorite this week at East Lake in the smallest field (30 players) on Tour. He also has the advantage of being rested – Singh didn’t compete in last week’s draining Ryder Cup.

Singh credits his confidence with the putter for his recent surge this year.

"Just believing that stroking a putt is simpler than what I made it out to be," he said. "I mean, for years and years I've been a very decent putter, a good putter for that matter. But I never really used that to my advantage. I just kind of took it for granted and when things started going bad, the negatives were very strong, a very strong thing."

Singh leads the field in Tour Championship experience, playing in his 15th Tour Championship. He has finished no worse than fourth since the tournament moved permanently to the East Lake Golf Club in 2004. Ernie Els is next in experience, playing in his 13th tournament, with Phil Mickelson in the field for the 12th time in his career.

Of the 30 players in the field, 10 were members of the winning U.S. squad at last week's Ryder Cup. They are Chad Campbell, Jim Furyk, Anthony Kim, Justin Leonard, Mickelson, Ben Curtis, Steve Stricker, Kenny Perry, Stewart Cink and Hunter Mahan. Furyk is the top favorite among the Americans at +750, while Kim was spectacular at the Ryder Cup and is +900 this week on WagerWeb.com.

Spain’s Sergio Garcia (+800 on WagerWeb.com) is the only member of the European Ryder Cup team to play in the Tour Championship, and he is the best of the returning players having finished fourth at East Lake last year.

Can Camilo Villegas give the FedEx Cup its second straight two-tournament victor? Villegas stopped Singh’s streak at the BMW Championship and is +1100 on WagerWeb.com

There are five past champions of the Tour Championship in the field. They are Billy Mayfair (1995), Mickelson (2000), Mike Weir (2001), Singh (2002) and Campbell (2003).

Interestingly enough, East Lake Country Club was rated the seventh-easiest course on the circuit last year with the 15th hole rated as the easiest of the PGA Tour's 55 courses.

InSpin.com