The longest current winning streak in the NBA (six games) belongs to a team that is on the outside looking in when it comes to the playoff race. The second-longest current winning streak is four games, shared by three teams — two of which are trying to qualify for the postseason. With five weeks left in the regular season, after a night on which the Lakers, Clippers and Thunder all lost and the Heat needed a big fourth-quarter comeback, it’s looking
When he met reporters before Sunday night’s game, Miami Heat coach Erik Spoelstra was asked if the Orlando Magic are a title contender. “Absolutely,” the coach replied. “There is no doubt about it. Anytime you have an MVP candidate like (Dwight Howard) and then personnel that fits, you’re a contender.” Writers covering both teams took that quote and ran with it, but not in the way you might expect. In Orlando, Spoelstra was taken with a grain of salt. From Josh Robbins of the
Two days after having their eight-game winning streak snapped, the Chicago Bulls host the Utah Jazz tonight in a game that should feature a lot of hard drives to the rim. Derrick Rose, one of the most athletic guards in the league, is mired in a mini-shooting slump in his last two games and may be feeling the burn of the lockout-shortened season. That, or being a part-time member of an injury-riddled backcourt. Rose shot just 6-for-22 against in a 99-94 loss to
Eight days until the trading deadline. Eight days for the Indiana Pacers to find the missing piece for a legitimate run at the conference finals, or for the Minnesota Timberwolves to acquire the player that makes them a playoff team. Eight days for the Orlando Magic to go all in on Dwight Howard or blow it up and start over. Eight days for the Atlanta Hawks to avoid the luxury tax or the Los Angeles Lakers to add to it. Eight days to
MIAMI – OK, he did it again. LeBron James, the talented and tormented Miami Heat forward, declined to take a late-game shot Friday at Utah. He saw a double-team coming and passed to forward Udonis Haslem, who missed a jumper. The Heat lost, 99-98. You’d be tempted to think it was the All-Star game all over again. It wasn’t. This wasn’t some made-for-TV pickup game. It was a regular-season game. It mattered. Now, the LeBron debate can continue. “At the end of the
“I know the chatter will begin,” LeBron James said. Is that chatter” as in talk? Or “chatter”as in “chattering” teeth? Just five nights after he was taken to task (by some harder than by others) for not attempting the game-tying shot in the All-Star game, LeBron James had a brilliant fourth quarter until that quarter came to an end. With the game on the line in Utah, James passed to Udonis Haslem for an open 17-foot jumper that missed, and Miami’s winning
Utah Jazz forward Jeremy Evans will replace Iman Shumpert of the New York Knicks in Saturday’s Slam Dunk Contest at All-Star Weekend. The NBA announced the switch Wednesday. Shumpert has tendinitis in his left knee. The 6-9 Evans is in his second season. Of his 88 career baskets, 61 have been dunks, including 30 alley-oops. The four-player dunk field remains all first-time participants and exclusively forwards. Evans joins Houston’s Chase Budinger, Indiana’s Paul George and Minnesota’s Derrick Williams – not exactly name recognition. Believe
NEW YORK — I alluded to this in yesterday’s power rankings: Coaches need to set examples, and coaches need to impart upon their players that the worst time to get a technical foul is in the fourth quarter. Mike Brown picked up two of them in rapid succession Saturday night in the fourth quarter of the Lakers-Jazz game, and today he is paying the price. NBA vie president of violence Stu Jackson announced that Brown has been suspended one game without pay and fined