As the season winds down with the playoffs set to begin one week from tomorrow, players and teams are starting to feel more tension and desperation. It showed on a Thursday night that featured 11 technical fouls, five flagrant fouls and three ejections in three games with teams jockeying for playoff positioning. We start with the Miami Heat, who extended their winning streak to five games as they beat the league-leading Chicago Bulls 83-72. Despite missing Chris Bosh and Derrick Rose, the game
An overnight windstorm knocked out our internet access (and many of our TV channels) for 36 hours. Man, it was like the Dark Ages. I feel bad about there being no Tuesday Spin; this one is both late and abbreviated. Catching Up Among the things I missed was Monday’s triple-OT classic: Dirk Nowitzki’s 40 and Al Jefferson with 28 and 26 among many great fantasy lines. Can’t believe the Thunder were held to 25 points in a half, by anybody. The Clippers are
MIAMI – Pssst…want to know the biggest problem with the Heat’s halfcourt offense right now? It’s forwards Udonis Haslem, Shane Battier and Mike Miller. Haslem, Battier and Miller – the Heat’s second most-important trio behind the Big Three — are the reason
Mike Miller, Udonis Haslem and Shane Battier are slowing the Heat's offense with their struggles.
NEW YORK — You won’t find either of these items in the box scores this morning: _ Waiting for Dwyane Wade outside the visitors’ locker room at Madison Square Garden yesterday afternoon was Vogue editor Anna Wintour, who had her family with her, her trademark sunglasses in her hands, was wearing a 10,000 watt smile and showing off bright eyes that could melt a glacier. Who knew? She made small talk with Wade about a book he is finishing writing, and he
NEW YORK — On a beautiful Sunday afternoon in New York City, the old cliché held true; There’s a first time for everything. Unfortunately, today wouldn’t be the day for the first that Knicks fans were hoping for… That would have been the first time that Carmelo Anthony’s Knicks beat LeBron James’ Heat in Madison Square Garden. Instead, it was the first time that Mike Woodson lost a home game as the head coach of the New York Knicks. After dropping the
A potential first round matchup gets a vigorous nod for Sunday’s best game when the Miami Heat make their first and only appearance in New York against the Knicks. That is, until the playoffs. New York (31-28) is currently tied with Philadelphia for the seventh and eighth seeds but holds the tiebreaker. Miami (41-17) lost 96-86 in overtime in Chicago on Thursday. LeBron James missed a game-sealing free throw that allowed the Bulls to make an improbable comeback without Derrick Rose, essentially locking
So how many seasons are the Miami Heat going to act like the NBA championship is their birthright and merely a formality? Not one, not two, not three, not four … It’s sometimes hard to tell whether the Heat are bored, whistling in the dark or still trying to figure it out. But one thing is certain: the basketball they are playing right now is not good enough to win a title. “We all know we have to take a real big step forward as a
April is supposed to be the time of the NBA season when the best teams gear up for the playoffs and head into it playing their absolute best basketball. The Heat must have missed that memo. And the Bulls’ starters, too. With the NBA regular season slowly but surely winding down, two of the top teams in the Eastern Conference are heading into the postseason with plenty of uncertainty and several important questions to still resolve. For the Chicago Bulls, the team with