The Boston Celtics aren’t going to go quietly in the NBA’s Eastern Conference Finals. Following in the mold of Oklahoma City out West, the Celtics responded to the home crowd by delivering a strong effort in a must-win spot over Miami and took Game 3 101-91 and cut the Heat’s series lead to 2-1.
If NASCAR’s Sprint Cup season were a hockey game we’d have concluded the first period last week with Kasey Kahne’s win in Charlotte. Twelve races of the 36 on the docket have been completed, and Greg Biffle is holding on to the lead as drivers converge on Dover for the FedEx 400 on Sunday.
At the start of the week the Milwaukee Brewers were left for dead by most baseball observers, including me and including pretty much every Brewer fan I see—and given that I live thirty miles from Miller Park that’s a fair number. Then catcher Jonathan Lucroy, swinging a red-hot bat, broke his hand in a freak accident and joined Alex Gonzalez and Mat Gamel as starters on the disabled list. And this week began with a four-game series against the Los Angeles Dodgers, merely the team with the best record in baseball. As far as the good people of Wisconsin were concerned, the time had come to shift the conversation to fishing, summer vacations and early talk on the Green Bay Packers. But then the Brewers delivered a shocking four-game sweep of the Dodgers and put themselves back on the radar. Can the good times last long enough for Milwaukee to really get back into the hunt?
As I watched the perfect playoff run of the San Antonio Spurs come to an unceremonious ending last night in Oklahoma City, I thought of a line by former Laker coach and current Heat president Pat Riley. In his book Showtime, the story of the 1987 Lakers, Riley recalled when his team won the first two games of the Finals over the Celtics in decisive fashion and then lost Game 3. “Great, Riley, recalled thinking. “No more talk about sweeps.” I wonder if Gregg Popovich, similarly hard-nosed, although less adept at covering it up as the Spurs head man, is thinking the same thing the morning after Oklahoma City opened up a can in Game 3, to the tune of 102-82.
The Chicago White Sox have caught fire in the AL Central race. A three-game sweep on the road in Tampa Bay pushes the White Sox winning streak to eight games, lifts their record to 29-22 and has moved them into first place. With a nine-game homestand starting tomorrow against Seattle, Toronto and Houston there’s every reason to think Robin Ventura’s team can keep this going into June. How are they getting it done?
No one questioned the Boston Celtics’ heart coming into the Eastern Conference Finals against Miami, but plenty of people, TheSportsNotebook included, questioned their ability to even extend this series as far as six games. Both points of view were vindicated in an epic 115-111 overtime game won by the Heat to take a 2-0 series lead. Boston turned in an extraordinary effort, one that leads you to wonder if they couldn’t win playing like this, can they possibly make this series anything more interesting than whether they can cover pointspreads?
The Los Angeles Kings and New Jersey Devils went to overtime in a clean, relatively penalty-free Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Finals and a breakaway goal from Kings center Anze Kopitar handed Los Angeles a 2-1 win to get the series underway.
The vultures are circling around the Philadelphia Phillies now that Roy Halladay has gone to the disabled list, not to return until mid-July at the earliest. It’s even being speculated that the Phils need to be sellers at the trade deadline. In a span of two months they’ve gone from a 3-1 favorite to win the World Series to everyone throwing in the towel. But is this really justified
The Stanley Cup Finals begin tonight when the New Jersey Devils host the Los Angeles Kings. It’s not the matchup anyone would have predicted when this postseason began in mid-April, but it rarely is in the NHL. The Devils were seeded #6 in the East, while Los Angeles was #8 in the West, only the second eight-seed to make the Finals since the league went to the current playoff format back in 1994. TheSportsNotebook previews the series…
If the San Antonio Spurs are going to play like they did last night, we might as well just call off the rest of the NBA playoffs right now. Even without a big offensive night from Tim Duncan, San Antonio shot 55 percent, buried 11 treys, built up a 16-point lead after three quarters and then turned back an Oklahoma City push to capture Game 2 of the Western Conference Finals by a 120-111 count.
The Toronto Blue Jays’ struggles last week can’t be considered unexpected—not when your schedule is six games against Tampa Bay & Texas, two teams you can make a credible argument are the top two in the American League. But each team has its own set of issues—the Rays are missing Evan Longoria and Desmond Jennings from the lineup and the Rangers, as TheSportsNotebook noted in this past Saturday’s AL West report, had hit a bit of a sluggish stage. If you aspire to make the playoffs, like Toronto does, you shouldn’t be overmatched. But the Jays were, especially the pitching.
The Miami Heat’s strength all year has been lockdown defense. The Boston Celtics’ bugaboo all year has been rebounding. A combination of the two delivered Miami a decisive 93-79 win Game 1 of the Eastern Conference Finals last night in South Beach.