Page 1112 of 2956

      USA-Canada rematch brewing? Canada knocks off Russia

      February 25, 2010 /

      Goalie Roberto Luongo stopped 25 of 28 shots to lead Canada to a surprising 7-3 victory over Russia in the quarterfinals of the 2010 Winter Olympics.

      From the Washington Post:

      They weren’t kidding around. Team Canada, so rattled after losing to the United States in pool play Sunday, pole-axed the talented Russians, 7-3, in a quarterfinal game Wednesday evening at Canada Hockey Place. The Canadians will face the winner of Wednesday night’s late game between Slovakia and Sweden in the semifinals Friday.

      What all of Canada had built into an Alex Ovechkin vs. Sidney Crosby matchup — the red-clad, hockey-mad fans gave the arena the look of Verizon Center during a Caps-Penguins playoff game — instead turned into an eye-averting onslaught. Ovechkin was certainly a focal point, both for the crowd, which booed him during introductions and every chance it got, and for the Canadians, who hit him so hard and so often that Ted Leonsis probably had difficulty getting out of bed this morning. But neither of them had a point.

      Not only were the Canadian goals plentiful, despite the Crosby drought, but some of them were works of art, tremendous displays of teamwork and crisp passing and anticipation. That isn’t always the case in Olympic play, where teams usually get only one or two practices before pool play begins.

      One more win for USA and Canada and the greatest rematch known to man will commence.

      All right, so it wouldn’t be the greatest rematch known to man (everyone knows that the Ninja Turtles vs. the Shredder in “TMNT II: The Secret of the Ooze” was the greatest rematch known to man), but it would make for great, Olympic-style drama.

      The Olympics

      United States narrowly defeats Switzerland

      February 24, 2010 /

      Propelled by two goals from Zach Parise and another powerful performance by goalie Ryan Miller, the U.S. men’s hockey team has advanced to the semifinals. The team faced a tough competitor in Switzerland, but found an edge in the last period to earn the 2-0 victory.

      From ESPN.com:

      But Zach Parise put all that frustration aside, deflecting a wrist shot from Brian Rafalski early in the third period, then scored into an empty net late to seal a 2-0 quarterfinal win that sends the U.S. to the next round against the winner of Wednesday night’s game between the Czech Republic and Finland.

      “Relief and excitement, especially in a tight game like that when you are doing everything but score,” said Parise, who failed to score on his first 13 shots of the tournament. “The goalie was great and we did a good job of sticking with it. “We were pretty confident and said just keep putting pucks at him.”

      Ryan Miller made 19 saves to backstop the victory and move the Americans within two wins of its first men’s hockey gold medal in 30 years.

      For myself, the U.S. hockey team’s run has been the most exciting part of the 2010 Winter Olympics. The feeling makes me want to gather up some of my closest friends and head to a fun bar to enjoy the next game. We can drink frothy glasses of beer, share stupid stories, look at pretty girls, and root for our countrymen.

      Wait — never mind. NBC is broadcasting the game at 3 PM ET on Friday. Scratch those plans.

      News, The Olympics

      Look at the Wizards!

      February 24, 2010 /

      The Washington Wizards are 3-1 since trading Antawn Jamison to Cleveland. They beat Minnesota, Denver and Chicago at home and lost to Toronto by five on the road.

      How are the Wizards pulling this off without four (Gilbert Arenas, Caron Butler, Antawn Jamison, Brendan Haywood) of their best players?

      First, Andray Blatche is playing like an All-Star. In the last four games, he has averaged a healthy 25-10, and is shooting 59% from the field. Is he likely to keep this up? No, but 18-8 is certainly possible.

      Al Thornton is averaging 16-4 (and shooting 53%) in three games since coming over to the Wizards as part of the Jamison trade. Those numbers seem reasonable if he starts getting starter’s minutes with Josh Howard sidelined.

      Two guys that came over last summer — Randy Foye and Mike Miller — have each come up with big games during this four-game span. Miller drained all five of this threes in a 17-point effort against the Timberwolves and Foye is averaging 15 points and 7.5 assists in the last two games. In the one game where neither player cracked double figures (vs. DEN), the now-injured Howard posted 20 points on 8-11 shooting from the field. Miller has been one of the most efficient shooting guards this season, while Foye has been either feast (14p, 5a, 44% shooting as a starter) or famine (6p, 1a, 39% shooting as a reserve), depending on whether or not he’s in the starting lineup.

      Truthfully, the Wizards are probably just sneaking up on a few teams. The Nuggets were coming off a big road win against Cleveland the night before and were outscored 34-15 in the fourth quarter by the well-rested Wizards. The Raptors were also coming off a road game the night before. (Granted, it was against the Nets, but still.) Chicago? Well, they don’t have an excuse.

      The Wizards upcoming schedule should be telling. Now that they’ve bit a few teams in the butt, it shouldn’t be difficult for Memphis, New York, New Jersey and Milwaukee (twice) to get up for this new-look Washington team.

      Are they going to make the playoffs? Hell no. But they might spoil a few other postseason runs.


      Photo from fOTOGLIF

      Fantasy Basketball, NBA

      How to fix the NBA

      February 24, 2010 /

      Commissioner David Stern exudes confidence, even when he’s telling the press that the NBA is going to lose an estimated $400 million this season. Bill Simmons thinks that teams regularly screw over their fan bases by unloading good players at the trade deadline, tanking games late in the season to get a better lottery pick, all without any discount to the season tickets. If a team gives up on the season, why do the tickets remain the same price?

      Here are a few of his ideas to fix this model:

      Any team that misses the playoffs cannot raise ticket prices the following season. Miss two straight playoffs, season-ticket holders get a 5 percent discount for renewals the following season. Miss three straight, it goes to 10 percent. Miss four straight, it jumps to 25 percent. Miss five straight, it jumps to 50 percent.

      Let’s say the 2009-10 Clips knew that, if they missed the playoffs a fourth straight year, they would be looking at 25 percent discounts across the board. Is there any way they keep Dunleavy? No. Is there any way they dump Camby at the deadline? No. Financially, it wouldn’t make sense.

      If I were running the NBA, eliminating the illusion of regret would be my biggest initiative. I would give every nonplayoff team the same odds for winning the lottery, just so these teams wouldn’t destroy six to eight weeks of a season for paying customers. Then, I would cut the season by four games, guarantee only the top 12 playoff spots, then decide the seventh and eighth seeds in each conference with a double-elimination tournament for every nonplayoff team that I call the Entertaining As Hell Tournament (see my 2007 column for the gory details). Boom, we just killed the tanking and salary-dumping issues.

      Couldn’t that work? Has it even been discussed? Wouldn’t it generate a ton of interest and extra revenue? Wouldn’t you watch? Wouldn’t it put a ton of pressure on teams to stop shutting their best guys down or giving away contract-year guys for no real reason? You can’t give away Camby! We need him for the Entertaining As Hell Tournament in April! And who knows, maybe a wacky 7-seed would gain momentum and pull off a Round 1 shocker in the playoffs. You never know. It’s never a bad thing when those three words are involved.

      Ticket discounts for non-playoff teams, equal opportunity in the lottery and a double-elimination tournament — these are all good (albeit fairly radical) ideas. The lottery idea was actually the way the NBA used to do things, and they should go back to it. Tanking at the end of the season is one of the biggest problems with today’s NBA.

      As for the length of the season, I wouldn’t stop at cutting just four games. I’d go with a 66-game season. Every team would play each of its division rivals four times (16 games) and all the other teams twice, once at home and once away (50 games). Cutting back on the regular season would make it matter again. Right now, it’s rare for a regular season game to hold much significance.

      Fewer games would also mean more schedule flexibility, so I’d set it up so that NBA teams would only play on certain days, say Tuesday (to avoid Mondays during football season), Friday and Saturday. That means there would be 15 games on each night, so NBATV could bounce around from game to game like the Red Zone Channel catching the best action and furious finishes. This would generate interest in the league and make fantasy basketball more appealing. Fantasy football is something that has really helped the NFL increase its popularity over the last decade.

      Lastly, I’d cut guaranteed contracts down to a max of four years to re-sign a team’s own players and three years for free agents. This would limit the impact of mistakes, and while I agree with Houston GM Daryl Morey that it’s not a system that favors the prepared, it would increase parity by allowing teams to recover from mistakes more quickly, which is another thing that makes the NFL so popular. (Mediocre teams would benefit from a lottery system that would give equal opportunity to win the #1 pick to all of the non-playoff teams, so you win some and you lose some.)

      The problem with Stern is that he’s too conservative in his thinking when it actually comes to the structure of the NBA, its regular season, and its postseason. He helped to usher in a new, more free-flowing game when the league passed stricter hand-check rules, and he has made the NBA an emerging global business, but when it comes to a relatively boring regular season, playoffs that are too long and too inclusive, and a lottery system that encourages tanking, he’s not very open-minded about trying something new.


      Photo from fOTOGLIF

      Fantasy Basketball, NBA

      Terrell Suggs chats with The Scores Report

      February 24, 2010 /

      Following defensive coordinator Rex Ryan’s departure from Baltimore after the 2008 season, pundits started to question whether or not the Ravens could still be a dominant defensive unit without him. But after finishing 2009 with a winning record, making the playoffs and absolutely obliterating the Patriots in the Wild Card Round, it’s clear that as long as the Ravens have players like Terrell Suggs and Ray Lewis, Baltimore’s defense will be just fine.

      Suggs was kind enough to chat with us recently about what the key to the Ravens’ success was last season, what it’s like to play alongside Ray Lewis and what ultimately made him decide to stay in Baltimore when he signed a new deal last offseason. Since he knows a thing or two about the topic, Terrell also broke down what makes a great pass rusher and whether or not he’d like to see the Ravens acquire Julius Peppers and/or Brandon Marshall this offseason.

      The Scores Report: Hi, this is Anthony.

      Terrell Suggs: How you doing, this is Terrell Suggs.

      Continue reading »

      Interviews, NFL

      « Older posts Newer posts »

      © 2026 The Scores Report – The National Sports Blog

      Theme by Anders Noren — Up ↑