It was not a good day for the Dallas Mavericks. Dirk Nowitzki was scratched with “swelling and soreness” in his knee and the team lost by 14 to FC Barcelona Regal in Spain. OJ Mayo missed all seven of his shots, Brandan Wright went 1-7 and Vince Carter 2-7; Elton Brand played 32 minutes as the emergency starter, for a modest 10 points and 3 rebounds. Chris Kaman was their best player, with a solid double-double. Stay tuned for updates on Nowitzki.
With the 2013 Eurobasket qualifiers coming to an end, the table is set for the highest level international competition in European basketball next summer. European stars Marcin Gortat, Mirza Teletovic and Marcin Gortat led their teams to successful campaigns, where they now will have the opportunity to challenge the likes of Spain, France, Russia, Greece and Lithuania in next summer’s tournament. The teams that successfully qualified included Montenegro, Israel, Serbia, Germany, Sweden, Croatia, Ukraine, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Latvia, Poland, Finland, Belgium
From fibaeurope.com Every player in the NBA is on vacation now, right? Wrong. Danilo Gallinari, Marcin Gortat, Omri Casspi and Jonas Jerebko are among the NBA players still playing international ball for their home countries in the qualification tournament for Eurobasket ’13. There are over 25 guys in qualification who are current NBA players, former NBA draft picks, or future NBA prospects. Next summer’s tournament will be held in Slovenia and will serve as the qualifier for the newly rechristened 2014
So we finally come to the conclusion of the regular season. In terms of who’s making the playoffs, anyway. With only one spot – the eighth seed of the Western Conference – still left for grabs, the Utah Jazz sealed the deal on Tuesday night by defeating the Phoenix Suns for their fourth consecutive victory, on national television, and clinched the final available seed. They are not done either, as they still have a chance to move up to the seventh seed, albeit
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
Steve Nash and the Phoenix Suns were far from playoff contention heading into the All-Star break. Since the beginning of March, however, they have turned a corner, compiling an 18-10 record and are just a half-game behind the Utah Jazz for the eighth seed in the Western Conference. Phoenix (32-30) looks to bounce back from a loss and stay squarely in the playoff picture as they host the Los Angeles Clippers in Thursday’s best game on TNT. They defeated the Clippers in the
Four overtime periods is not how you want to finish your third game in three nights. The exhausted Hawks never quit. Joe Johnson played over 55 minutes en route to 37 points and Zaza Pachulia was terrific, with 15 points and 20 rebounds. For Utah, seven players scored in double figures, led by Al Jefferson (28 & 17) and Paul Millsap (25 & 13) but somebody had to lose this very exciting contest. Elsewhere DEN @ MIN: Kevin Love was tremendous again,
The one game I expected to be a “rout” last night was instead a classic. What an effort by Kevin Love, who scored 51 points in the double-overtime loss, including seven 3-pointers. J.J. Barea had his first career triple-double for Minnesota (25 PTS, 14 AST, 10 REB) while playing 47 minutes — off the bench! Russell Westbrook (45) and Kevin Durant (40 PTS, 17 REB, 5 AST. 3 STL) were terrific for the Thunder, and although Derek Fisher missed nine