The NBA draft lottery is set for tonight at 8 p.m. ET, with Game 2 of the Celtics-Heat series coming up at 8:30 p.m. In the meantime, take a gander at some of the news from around the NBA on Wednesday. After convincingly losing Game 1, Rajon Rondo stated “Nothing dirty, but they have to hit the deck, too.’’ Knowing that the Celtics want to get more physical, LeBron James and Dwyane Wade had their say on the matter: “I expect to be quote,
Wednesday was my 16th wedding anniversary. It also was the 30th anniversary of one of the most anticipated playoff games in NBA history – Game 7 of the Eastern Conference finals between the Philadelphia 76ers and the Boston Celtics. The rivals met in the conference finals in three consecutive years from 1980-82. In 1981, the Sixers opened a 3-1 lead before the Celtics won the next three games by a combined five points. The following year, the Sixers again opened a 3-1
// If Dexter Pittman had done what he did to Lance Stephenson on the street instead of on the basketball court, he’d be facing felony assault charges. As it is, Pittman’s cheap shot in the waning moments of Miami’s Game 5 beatdown of the Indiana Pacers on Tuesday night is certain to earn him a multiple-game suspension. (On the Artest scale, this one is worthy of a 10-game suspension, IMHO, because of the degree of premeditation). If you haven’t seen the foul
Larry Bird is entitled to his opinion. I just wish he’d explain it a little more clearly. Bird told Indianapolis Star beat writer Mike Wells that his team went “soft” in Game 5, which is a curious choice of words to say the least. Did Bird want the team’s self-described “smashmouth” style of play to become “smash-face?” Because Udonis Haslem and Dexter Pittman certainly played smash-face basketball, and the opinion here is that both will be sitting out Game 6 in Indiana
Larry Bird signed David West as a free agent, traded for George Hill, removed the interim tag from Frank Vogel and picked up Leandro Barbosa for next to nothing. And over the longer haul, he finally reaped the rewards of waiting for dead weight to be cleared from the Indiana Pacers’ salary cap, and for drafting Roy Hibbert, Tyler Hansbrough and Paul George in consecutive years. For this, Bird was honored by his peers Wednesday when he was named the NBA’s Executive
Could the season be over already? This is the last regular-season edition of The Bernucca List, our weekly test of your NBA knowledge. It’s been fun and challenging coming up with these lists, and we hope it has been the same for you. Last week’s list was correctly solved by reader KleRoi, who answered, “Teams that never have reached the conference finals.” Believe it or not, the Atlanta Hawks are on the list. They are the only team that predates the formation of
By TERRY LYONS NEW YORK, APRIL 6, 2012 — There’s a common belief that when someone passes from this earth, their life passes before their eyes in an instant. If that is the case, together with one of my best friends in the world, I can now attest to living through that experience when we attended Magic/Bird on Broadway last Wednesday afternoon. For 90 minutes, we must’ve been out cold because our basketball lives passed right in front of our eyes
