NBA hits the All-Star Break

oddsmaker.ag and the NBA give us two pretty good national TV matchups to cap off the first half of the regular season Thursday night, before most of the league takes a few days off for the All-Star Break. In the opener the San Antonio Spurs, 46-9 through Tuesday's play, visit the 37-16 Chicago Bulls (8 pm Eastern, TNT). And after that the 38-16 Dallas Mavericks visit the 27-26 Phoenix Suns (10:30 pm Eastern, TNT).

San Antonio will go into the All-Star Break with the best record in the league. After beating the Nets in New Jersey on Tuesday 102-85 the Spurs are 6-2 on their current nine-game road trip, and lead the Southwest Division and the Western Conference by 7.5 games over second-place Dallas. Coach Popovich's outfit also leads Boston by six games in the battle for home-court advantage throughout the upcoming NBA playoffs. And San Antonio is a league-best 34-19 against the oddsmaker.ag pointspreads this season.

Chicago has won three in a row after defeating Charlotte on Tuesday night 106-94. So the Bulls own the largest divisional lead in the league, 13 games over second-place Indiana in the Central. And Chicago has crept to within two games of the Celtics in the fight for the best record in the Eastern Conference. Also, like the Spurs, the Bulls have been a moneymaker this season, going 31-20 vs. the pointspreads.

These two teams met back in November in San Antonio, with the Spurs coming away with a 103-94 decision. Chicago, a 6.5-point underdog that night, led that game by 10 points at the half. But San Antonio outscored the Bulls 37-12 in the third quarter to take over. And even though the teams combined for 64 points in the fourth quarter, the game played UNDER its oddsmaker.ag total of 203.

Dallas had a 10-game winning streak snapped at the buzzer Friday night in Denver, then won in Houston on Sunday 106-102. So the Mavs own the second-best record in the West, although they're likely to be the four seed when the playoffs start.

Phoenix, meanwhile, since falling six games below .500 back in mid-January, has won 12 of its last 17, including a 102-101 decision over Utah on Tuesday, to pull back over break-even. But the Suns are still 2.5 games back of Denver and the Jazz, who own the last two playoff slots in the West.

Dallas and Phoenix have met once before this season, the Mavs winning 106-91 in Big D back in mid-December. Suns G Steve Nash played just four minutes that night after colliding with Dallas' Tyson Chandler in the first quarter, and his team suffered without him.

As of Wednesday morning oddsmaker.ag is listing the Spurs as the third favorite on its updated NBA championship betting board at +150, behind only the Heat at +100 and the Lakers at +125. The Bulls and Mavs are both getting +1,000, and the Suns are listed at +15,000.

The 60th NBA All-Star Game will be played Sunday in Los Angeles (8 pm Eastern, TNT), and of course oddsmaker.ag will be offering action on the game. The NBA regular season then starts up again Tuesday.