Category: NBA (Page 203 of 595)
The NBA announced Sunday evening that Kevin Garnett has been suspended for Game 2 of the Celtics’ first round series with the Heat “for striking the Miami Heat’s Quentin Richardson in the head with an elbow.” In addition, Richardson has been fined $25,000 for his role in the altercation.
Some are saying that this suspension “opens the door” for the Heat, but the truth is that the door is pretty open with or without Garnett in the lineup. The Celtics did look good for a quarter and a half in Game 1, but that doesn’t mean that they were/are a shoe-in to win the series.
Did he deserve to be suspended? It would have been nice if the altercation could have been diffused without all the posturing, but that’s Kevin Garnett for you. He relishes in sticking his chin in his opponent’s face and this time he threw a (stupid) elbow. Now his team has to try to win without him.
Game 2 is on TNT Tuesday night.
Photo from fOTOGLIF
Late last year, there was some question as to how Andre Miller was fitting in with the Blazers, but in January, he started settling in and had a nice second half of the season. With Brandon Roy out for the foreseeable future, Miller had his best game of the season, posting 31-5-8 along with three steals in a 105-100 win in Phoenix.
The game was pretty nip-and-tuck the whole way, but a 9-3 Blazer run late in the fourth quarter gave Portland a seven-point lead with 1:29 to play. The Suns kept fighting and a pair of missed free throws by Jerryd Bayless with 0:12 to play opened the door for a game-tying three-point attempt by Steve Nash which only hit the front of the rim.
Game 2 is Tuesday night.
I had a feeling the Lakers were going to come out and play the best basketball they had in months. Actually, most fans probably demanded it, considering the team had been playing with the intensity of a turtle. In defeating the Thunder 87-79 on Sunday, it looks like they’re back on track.
It was clear from the opening drive that the Lakers knew how important this game was. In the first quarter, the defending champions chose their shots wisely, consistently looking for the open man and finding him. For the first time all year, Kobe Bryant, Derek Fisher, Lamar Odom, Pau Gasol and Andrew Bynum ran the offense as a team, and it effectively stunned the Thunder when it mattered most. Kobe wasn’t worried about putting up numbers, and distributed the ball with an ability we often forget he contains. He routinely fed the ball down low to the big men, Gasol and Bynum. Both were aggressive, yet Bynum was a pleasant surprise after missing the last 13 games. The two combined for 32 points and 25 rebounds as the Thunder struggled to neutralize them.
Still, the Thunder did play well defensively overall — the team just couldn’t match the Lakers on the other end of the court. I could say Artest and Kobe shut down Kevin Durant, but that wasn’t the case, as the scoring champion still tallied 24 points. While that’s seven points under his league average, it wasn’t greater than the differential in their loss. Instead, their 3-point shooting and weakness down in the post caused them problems. The Thunder were only 2-16 from behind the arc and were blocked nine times.
And now, a prophetic death knell for the Thunder: Laker coach Phil Jackson has never lost a series after winning the first game. He’s 45-0, in fact, and should feel confident about this one given his team’s recent performance.
To add insult to injury, or possibly injury to insult, the Jazz lost more than Game 1 on Saturday night. They may have lost Mehmet Okur as well.
Utah Jazz center Mehmet Okur was helped off the court after reinjuring his left Achilles tendon in the second quarter of Game 1 against the Denver Nuggets on Saturday night.
Okur left the arena on crutches, ESPN’s Holly Rowe reported.
“I felt something pop,” said Okur, who will undergo an MRI on Sunday.
This is a blow to an already thin frontcourt that is without Andrei Kirilenko for the next couple of weeks. Without Okur, the Jazz are left with two big men that get regular minutes — Carlos Boozer and Paul Millsap. Kosta Koufos or Kyrylo Fesenko will have to step in and play. Otherwise, the Jazz will have to ride Boozer and Millsap and go very small when they give one or the other a rest.
I thought Utah would squeak out a series victory, but with Okur and Kirilenko out, they face an uphill battle.
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