Janet Jones, wife of Wayne Gretzy, has been implicated in a gambling ring financed by former Philadelphia Flyers star and current Phoenix Coyotes assistant coach Rick Tocchet.
Along with Jones, the Kings’ Jeremy Roenick and at least one Hollywood star were said to have placed wagers with the operation.
I have fond memories of being twelve years old and watching Janet Jones in the 1986 gymnastics movie/Mitch Gaylord vehicle, “American Anthem.” The girl could really fill out a unitard.
The #2 ranked Blue Devils advanced to 10-0 in ACC play with an 87-83 win in Chapel Hill, NC. J.J. Redick led Duke with 35 points behind some terrific shooting down the stretch.
After a very sloppy first half, Duke opened the second period with a 12-0 run, pushing the lead to 17. The run featured a phenomenal alley-oop dunk and a long three pointer by freshman center Josh McRoberts.
With some inspired play, the Tar Heels cut the lead to five with just over ten minutes to play, but Redick scored five straight points on a deep jumper and a steal to push the lead back to 10. North Carolina struck back with a 20-5 run to take the lead by five with four and a half minutes to play. Duke countered with a 18-6 run (including eleven clutch points by Redick) to take the lead by seven with just under a minute in the game.
With the game seemingly in hand, Duke missed a couple of free throws and committed a costly turnover, allowing the Tar Heels to cut the lead to one with 33 seconds to play. But Greg Paulus calmly hit two free throws to put the game out of reach.
Duke continues to get decent production from players not named Redick or Williams. It seems like every game, one of the role players steps up – whether it be Sean Dockery, Greg Paulus, Lee Melchionni or McRoberts – to provide that third scorer to compliment their two All-Americans. Barring a complete meltdown, they’ll be the #1 seed in the East or South regionals.
And mark my words, J.J. Redick is going to be a very good pro.
Yep, you read that right. The NBA world was turned on its ear Tuesday night when the best team in the league lost to one of its cellar-dwellers, 99-98. But the upset is not as surprising as the team’s respective records would indicate – the Hawks have actually been playing pretty well of late, and their win against Detroit is their fourth win in the last five games.
Much of their success can be attributed to the play of Joe Johnson. Over the last 10 games, Johnson has averaged 24.1 points, 4.0 rebounds and 6.2 assists, while shooting a phenomenal .528 from the field. But the trade that brought Johnson to the Hawks this offseason still doesn’t look like all that good of a deal. The Hawks traded away Boris Diaw, who is having a breakout season with the Suns (11.6 ppg, 6.8 rpg, 5.5 apg), along with two conditional future first round picks.
One also wonders where the Hawks would be had they not passed on Chris Paul with the #2 overall pick in last year’s draft. Paul is having an outstanding year and is literally running away with Rookie of the Year honors at this point in the season. The thought of a Paul/Johnson backcourt has to have Hawks GM Billy Knight working furiously in his garage, trying to build a time machine.
Caught the last 10 minutes of Mike & Mike this morning, and heard just enough to want to do a jig. Well, okay, two of the decisions have me dancing, and the others, if nothing else, didn’t make me want to throw a brick at my TV. With ESPN taking over Monday Night Football, the booth and sidelines have been stacked with Bristol’s finest.
First, the booth:
Play by play: Mike Tirico. I would have been happier with Mike Patrick – no one sells a game better than Patrick does – but Tirico is no slouch, either. More importantly, football nation breathes a collective sigh of relief that they didn’t go with founding father Chris Berman.
Commentary: Joe Theissman. If there’s a weakness here, it’s Joe. He doesn’t bother me as much as he bothers friends of mine, but he does have a tendency to state the obvious. But he’s also brutally honest about coaching decisions, officiating, and every other aspect of the game that offends his senses, and I like that in a color guy.
Now for the masterstroke:
Commentary: Tony Kornheiser. Hell, yes. As an avid “PTI” fan, this just makes me giddy. I think of this move akin to the hiring of Dennis Miller, only this time Dennis has an actual knowledge of football. Kornheiser is whip smart and easily the funniest guy on ESPN’s payroll. Brilliant move, though how are they going to get him to leave Washington DC?
Sidelines: Suzy Kolber and Michelle Tafoya. Can’t say I’m terribly enamored of Tafoya for whatever reason, but I loves my Suzy.
The poll that ESPN posted with the story showed that 53.1% of the readers actually do not like the new crew. Let’s hear it, sports fans. What do and don’t you like about the new crew?
As evidenced by the Kings’ 96-78 win over the Utah Jazz on Sunday, the team is suddenly playing much better defense. The catalyst in this transformation has been Ron Artest, who played in the game despite a nasty injury.
Even hobbled with a hip pointer that was so tender he could hardly walk Saturday, Artest made a difference, not so much in hawking ballhandlers, but just being out there.
Artest looked like a man trying to play ball while weighted down with a backpack loaded with bricks. It was painful to cut, to run, to crash the boards, and he grimaced and winced through most of his nearly 36 minutes on his way to nine points, four rebounds, two blocked shots and a steal.
But if Kings coach Rick Adelman wanted an example of guts and guile, of taking a season personally, he got it, wearing No. 93. “I don’t know how he played and fought through that,” Adelman said. “That’s the one thing I really like about him. He doesn’t care that he had nine points, but he had a real presence on the floor defensively, and he had a presence with the way he played. I was amazed.”
Artest, always good for an interesting quote, compared the Kings’ defensive habits to nicotine.
“It’s like when you smoke cigarettes, you got to take that nicotine patch and break that habit,” Artest explained. “We’ve got a habit of losing right now, (and) it can become a real bad habit. It wasn’t hard for Snoop Dogg to stop smoking marijuana.”
There is very litte evidence that marijuana is addictive, but I get Ron’s point. In the span of a few games, the Kings are already tougher and more stubborn on defense, and this will translate to wins. This is the good that comes from trading for Artest. The downside is that you just don’t know how long the fuse is on his tempermental personality. He is going to explode again – it’s just a matter of when.
Since they were going to lose Peja Stojakovic at the end of the year, it was a good move by Sacramento to bring Artest in. Being mired in last place in the Pacific Division, they had little to lose. With the win on Sunday, they are now only four games behind the Lakers for the 8th spot in the West. If they can get Brad Miller and Bonzi Wells back from injury, and can keep up this newfound defensive intensity, they just might make a run at the playoffs.
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