The 41-40 Boston Celtics will open up the 2013 NBA Playoffs on the road against the New York Knicks with game one of their best of seven pro basketball series on Saturday afternoon. Tip off time from Madison Square Garden in New York City is scheduled for 3PM Eastern Time with national television coverage provided by ABC.

The NBA betting odds from game one of this series has the home team New York Knicks favored by -7 ½ points with an over under line of 193 points. There has been no line movement in this game since the odds were released a few hours ago.

The teams have went head to head four times this season with the Knicks winning and covered the point spread in three of the four games. After Boston won the first meeting the Knicks have won three straight. Three games played under the total and one went over.

Boston has a road record of 14-27 on the year. The Celtics odds to win the NBA Championship have been set at +5000 odds. To make it to the Finals the Celtics are +2500 odds. The Celtics had long clinched their seventh seed in the playoffs and had nothing to play for in the waning days of the regular season. They have lost six of their past nine games. On the offensive side of the ball the Celtics connect on 46.5% of their shots which ranks sixth in the NBA in offensive field goal percentage. On defense they rank in the upper half of the league in all three key areas which are points allowed, field goal and three point defense. Since New York likes to launch a lot of threes the Celtics defend the perimeter well ranking fourth in the NBA in three point shooting defense by allowing 34.2% from beyond to arc to opponents. Where the Celtics have stumbled is in the rebounding department as they rank 29th and second to last in the NBA because they lack adequate size down low to support Kevin Garnett.

The Knicks are 31-10 playing on their home court. The Knicks are +1200 odds to win the NBA Title. To win the Eastern conference title New York is +600 odds. The Knicks were playing hard down the stretch to clinch the second seed in the Eastern conference. They have won 16 of their past 18 games. New York was a high scoring team this season ranking 11th in the league in points per game by pushing across 100 points a contest. They are heavily dependent from the three point line as they rank fourth in the league by sinking 37.6% of their shots. Because they shoot a lot of threes it has brought down the overall shooting percentage to 44.8% ranking 18th in the NBA. On defense the Knicks played great early and horribly during the middle stages of the season. They found their first month form defensively late in the season during their playoff push. New York allows 95.7 points a game ranking 7th in scoring defense. Critics of the team are concerned about the teams launching of threes and how they are better defended against during the playoffs.