San Antonio Spurs coach Gregg Popovich made it a habit to rest his veteran stars this season, come what may. Up until Game 3, the Coach of the Year had been treating the playoffs much the same way. Tim Duncan played 35 minutes in San Antonio’s 102-90 Game 3 victory Saturday night, and Tony Parker played 40. But during the first two games against the Utah Jazz, the only Spur to play more than 31 minutes was Parker, who logged 37
PHILADELPHIA—They turned back the clock Friday night in Philadelphia. With “The Doctor,’’ a.k.a. Julius Erving, officially welcomed back into the house, the “joint was jumping’’ as they used to say in his day. Meanwhile Dr. J’s old teammate turned coach, Doug Collins, pleaded with his team to keep plugging away in what appeared to be a lost cause, urged on by the some 20,000 red-and-white towel waving banshees, screaming “Defense. Defense’’ at their top of their lungs. The NBA playoffs returned to the
NEW YORK — It’s amazing how history repeats itself. Once again, Carmelo Anthony was unable to deliver a victory to a passionate and raucous Madison Square Garden in a decisive Game 3 of an NBA playoff series. Last year it was the Celtics, and this year, it’s the Heat. Both times, Anthony failed to deliver. Now, as ‘Melo stares at the prospect of being swept in the first round for the third time in his career and second time as a Knick,
This BS has got to stop, all right. Dallas Coach Rick Carlisle was right, noting “The dirty BS has to stop,” after losing Games 1-2 in Oklahoma City, not that a lot of tears were shed at seeing his defending world champions’ hair, and skeletal systems, mussed up. The Mavs play as rough as anyone, as Carlisle all but conceded in his plea for humanity. “Playoff basketball is physical,” said Carlisle. “We don’t like the cheap shots when they give them. They don’t
Notice a trend in the first round of the playoffs? Teams are missing and losing their star players. It is somewhat of an issue in the Western Conference, where the Los Angeles Lakers will be without suspended forward Metta World Peace for another four games and the Los Angeles Clippers will be without injured forward Caron Butler until perhaps the NBA Finals – if they get that far. Over in the East, there is a veritable All-Star team of sidelined players. Dwight Howard.
The challenge for the Heat now is maintain their focus long enough to sweep the Knicks.
For NBA writers, pregame with Gregg Popovich is a little like trading engaging barbs with Bill Maher. It can be humorous, but the guy you are talking to is a minimum of two times as quick as you and five times as smart, so step carefully. Pop is a guy who majored in Soviet Studies at the Air Force Academy and worked in highly sensitive missions on the border of Russia and Turkey when he was a younger man. So while he
I know I should be writing about the playoffs. Derrick Rose tore his ACL. The Orlando Magic have a pulse. The New York Knicks might never win another playoff game. Yada, yada, yada. At some point, I’ll get around to it. Instead, I’m going to write about something I thought would not happen in my lifetime: The 1972-73 Philadelphia 76ers are no longer the worst team in NBA history. I have been following the NBA for 40 years. I have always been fascinated by