Daily Basketball
NBA and NCAA blogging on an occasionally daily basis
Archive for May, 2006
May 24, 2006 at 5:33 pm · Filed under NBA
After a short hiatus, the CenterCourt Hoops blog is active again after spending over a week without any posts on the latest NBA news and rumors.
The Toronto Raptors won the lottery, giving them the rights to the #1 pick in this year’s NBA draft. The Chicago Bulls are going to receive the #2 overall from the New York Knicks, and the Bobcats will try to continue their expansion with the #3 pick. Portland dropped to number four…
The Heat got off to a strong start in their series against the Detroit Pistons, who just barely got past Lebron James and his team a couple days ago. Dwayne Wade had a great game, but you’ve got to think the Pistons are wanting to take a couple days to rest.
The Dallas Mavericks will take on the Phoenix Suns tonight in the Western Conference championships. After Dirk Nowitzki was reunited against Michael Finley during the series against the Spurs, Nowitzki will know find himself playing against former teammate Steve Nash.
There has been a lot of talk about several teams making some changes over the offseason, besides the talk that Larry Brown will have his contract bought out. The Timberwolves are saying they’d rather re-build around Kevin Garnett, though he could end up in Chicago if the Bulls can find a talent to package with their #2 pick.
May 13, 2006 at 12:11 pm · Filed under NBA
For those of you who haven’t checked it out yet, we have created a Hoops Dynasty blog which you can read here. If you still have joined WhatIfSports, make sure you do. Registration is free, and gives you the opportunity to have you own team in most sports.
In case you haven’t been keeping up with the news lately, here’s the list of official award winners for the past NBA season:
Most Valuable Player: Steve Nash, Phoenix Suns
Defensive Player of the Year: Ben Wallace, Detroit Pistons
Coach of the Year: Avery Johnson, Dallas Mavericks
Executive of the Year: Elgin Baylor, Los Angeles Clippers
Rookie of the Year: Chris Paul, New Orleans-Oklahoma City Hornets
Most Improved Player: Boris Diaw, Phoenix Suns
Sixth Man: Mike Miller, Memphis Grizzlies
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There’s been a lot of dispute over Chris Paul’s near-unanimous selection for top NBA rookie. Paul received 124 of the 125 first-place votes. The one vote he didn’t receive was from Utah Jazz broadcaster Ron Boone, who voted for the home team rookie Deron Williams, who finished in sixth place overall.
Boone’s defense of his selection: “I thought Deron finished stronger than Chris Paul.” The Hornets fell out of the playoff race after beginning the season strong. Boone says he wasn’t purposefully trying to stop Paul from receiving all of the first place votes, and also brought up the head-to-head matchups between Paul and Williams, where Williams won or tied in most statisitics.
NBA veteran Cliff Robinson received a five-game suspension by the league for failing a drug test. Robinson has been one of the top subs for the Nets, and the team was less than thrilled to hear of the news. “Cliff has been our top substitute the entire year,” said Rod Thorn, whose team is battling the Miami Heat in the second round.
The Phoenix Suns are becoming quite familiar with the Staples Center, after coming back to win the series against the Los Angeles Lakers. The Clippers don’t gain much of an advantage by playing on their home floor, considering the Suns have been practicing there for a few weeks now.
For those of you fans whose teams didn’t make it to the playoffs, the NBA draft lottery is coming up soon. The draft will be televised to see whose teams will have the first grabs at Tyrus Thomas and Adam Morrison.
May 6, 2006 at 4:08 pm · Filed under NBA
While the city of Los Angeles was looking forward to an NBA Playoffs showdown between the Clippers and Lakers, the Phoenix Suns are looking to win Game 7 tonight after being down 3-1 in the series. You can expect to see Raja Bell guarding Kobe Bryant again. It will be more difficult to see how Kobe performs. It seems like he would want to blow up for one hundred after the clotheslining and trash-talking between he and Bell, but the team has played its best basketball when the entire team is involved.
“Obviously, the way he’s played, he’s definitely changed a mind-set. If there was a mind-set someplace else, he’s changed it.” There were the words Sacramento Kings‘ coach Rick Adelman used to describe his star guard/forward. Ron Artest? Nope, apparently Adelman wants to see Bonzi Wells back with the team next — assuming that Adelman is able to retain his coaching job.
Kiki Vandeweghe is done with his front-office position with the Denver Nuggets, after a disappointing run in the playoffs and throughout the season. There have been rumors for some time that he’d take a job in New York with the Knicks, but it doesn’t seem like any Knicks’ officials have any idea who will be working where next season.
May 3, 2006 at 4:11 pm · Filed under NBA
Raja Bell of the Phoenix Suns was suspended after clotheslining Kobe Bryant in game four the of theirs series. The suspension is for one game, and don’t be surprised if the suspension ignites Bryant and the Lakers to a victory to send them on to the series upset.
Bell and Bryant have been going at each other all season, so it seemed inevitable that one of the player’s temper would flare. Bell said that he threw the elbow as retaliation after Bryant had been playing too physical.
The NBA has been dishing out fines and suspensions, though David Stern has said that he thinks that are still calls being missed. Shaq was fined $25,000 for his comments about the referees, and there have been some various other fines and complaints made.
The NBA also released the list of early-entry candidates for the 2006 draft. We’re not sure what it takes to apply for the draft. You can’t like some of these guys chances. Will Indiana freshman Cem Dinc really get drafted? We read somewhere that Dinc played twelve minutes the whole season.
If you haven’t checked out WhatIfSports yet, make sure you do. They just released a new Hoops Dynasty world with two games a day, and you can assume more will be available soon. There are also job openings available throughout the next few days, so sign up while you can.
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