ATLANTA – If Atlanta’s Game 6 elimination loss to Indiana was Josh Smith’s final game as a Hawk, the star’s final performance was a near-perfect microcosm of his nine-year tenure in Atlanta. Friday night was fittingly consumed with frustration and bad decision-making, plenty of impressive defensive stops, and conclusively mixed results. The Hawks lived and died with Smith as their star all season and eventually paid for all of his shortcomings on Friday. [Read more…]
HOUSTON – It wasn’t Kevin Durant, but the other Kevin — a familiar face who turned foe on the brink of the regular season who came back to Houston and delivered the daggers that ended the Rockets’ playoff run Friday night. Kevin Martin moves on. James Harden goes home. Nobody could have predicted the spills, twists and turns this series took along the way before ending in six games with a 103-94 victory for Oklahoma City — including the part about the
Though it’s trumpeted as a launchpad for great big shiny heroics, playoff basketball’s cruel truth is that the no-shows have a particular, formative role to play in the maturation–or atrophy–of each series, as well. [Read more…]
As we entered the 2013 playoffs, the Miami Heat were poised to repeat as NBA champions. Or so it would seem. As we wait to see where the challenger will come from, the Heat’s place in history is developing before our eyes. Will they become a dynasty or fold under the real life pressures of free agency and the salary cap? Will they take their place in the discussion of “Greatest Ever?” Or be a team that had a great run? [Read
NEW YORK — The quiet demeanor of a champion is unmistakable. His persistence is unassuming. He fights to the end, until the battle is won. When it is, he celebrates… But for a moment. Because then, it is on to the next challenge. The Boston Celtics are champions. The New York Knicks are not, and the unmitigated hubris that the Knicks collectively exhibited heading into Wednesday night’s Game 5—and how the Celtics responded to it—proved that. And you know what? In the long run, the Knicks
The deadline to enter the draft for college players has passed, and while there were some surprise returnees – namely Marcus Smart and Isaiah Austin – there were plenty of early entrants as well. To be exact: 77. Which thereby allows us to present Mock Draft 2.0, which includes the pre-lottery positions of all 30 teams based upon their records, and tiebreakers that were drawn at the Board of Governors meeting in late April. The big news here is this: Sources around
EL SEGUNDO, Calif. – Now, after the winter of the Lakers’ discontent… a summer that doesn’t look like three months at the beach, either. It was grisly to the end, which was even worse than the beginning, when the lowly Mavs beat them opening night in Staples, then they lost Steve Nash the next night in a loss at Portland. How would you like to be Mike D’Antoni, taking over at 5-6, with his point guard out until Dec. 22 … only
Before Game 4 of their Western Conference first-round series against the San Antonio Spurs, the Los Angeles Lakers handed out white towels to fans at the Staples Center. Apparently, someone in the marketing department didn’t understand symbolism. By halftime, those towels had become flags of surrender for the Lakers, the biggest underachieving team in the history of the NBA. Dwight Howard offered his own symbolism, figuratively throwing in the towel midway through the third quarter. Unwilling to grit his teeth and bang