// csprtContainer(); // ]]> Out of the four teams currently fighting for the eighth spot in the Western Conference, who would be most gratified to earn that berth? The Houston Rockets? In their post-Yao era, they tried to trade half their team before the season started to rebuild around Pau Gasol. That didn’t happen after the original Chris Paul trade was vetoed, and the two players who would probably be most gratified are Luis Scola and Goran Dragic, who were a part of
There were so many games last night (14) in the NBA, your fingers go calloused from switching the remote and your brain got scrambled by considering all the playoff possibilities. Bottom line: There are still eight nights left of regular season basketball, a lot can happen over those eight days, and we need to find a way to give you a synopsis of what’s up. To do that, we’ll focus today on the teams with 32-30 records. There are three of them, they
The Dallas Mavericks are clinging to the seventh seed in the cramped Western Conference playoff race. A loss tonight would inch them closer to being the first team since the 1997-1998 Bulls to miss the playoffs after a championship season. Relating further to those Bulls, the Mavericks are also working with a shortened lockout season. Dallas (34-28) looks to avoid that dubious feat and snap a two-game skid as they try to sweep the season series against the Houston Rockets for the second
Monday night’s triple-overtime thriller in Salt Lake City simply was one of the best games of the season. It was a three-hour commercial for why League Pass is worth every penny and Exhibit A for why I walk away laughing when some fool tries to explain why the college game is better than the NBA. We will get to that game in some detail. But the first matter of discussion is the Houston Rockets, whose late-season freefall gives North Korea’s space
After winning four straight games on the road just a week ago, the Houston Rockets sat alone in sixth place of the Western Conference. Since then, they have dropped three straight games, all against conference rivals who are fighting for the final playoff spot — Utah, Phoenix and Denver — to fall back to the eighth seed. Houston (32-28), in danger of losing its grip on a playoff berth, hosts the seventh-seeded Denver Nuggets to conclude a home-and-home game in Monday’s best game. The
Sixteen days to glory. The title of Bud Greenspan’s documentary of the 1984 Olympics also is fitting for the NBA season, which has just 16 days remaining and a dozen playoff spots still up for grabs. For argument’s sake, we’re going to assume middle-of-the-packers Indiana, Boston, Atlanta and Orlando will eventually clinch berths in the Eastern Conference, while the Los Angeles Lakers, Los Angeles Clippers and Memphis will sew up spots in the West. All seven of those teams have fewer than 25
Miami’s LeBron James and Houston’s Goran Dragic were named NBA Players of the Week on Monday. James won for the Eastern Conference. He averaged 30.5 points, 5.8 rebounds, 5.5 assists and 2.3 steals as Miami went 3-1. He led the Heat in minutes and scoring in all for games. James scored a season-high 41 points – including 14 straight Miami points in the fourth quarter – in a 99-93 win over Philadelphia on Tuesday. Dragic won for the Western Conference. He has been
Let’s go down the checklist, shall we? The Miami Heat are a team that suffers too many letdowns too consistently. Check. The Los Angeles Lakers cannot thrive when Andrew Bynum is a hothead. Check. The Oklahoma City Thunder scare the wits out of nobody. Check. The San Antonio Spurs are a machine. Check. Well, that was quite a Friday night in the NBA wasn’t it? And for different reasons than those that made Thursday such a special night. That’s the thing about this truncated, squished-together