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2 games were played in the NBA play-offs last night and normality was resumed in the two series that had previously thrown up the wildest results. In Boston the Bulls came close to another upset and kept the Celtics extremely close all game but with only a few seconds left Ray Allen got the ball and took a shot from behind the arc oblivious to the fact that Joakim Noah was in his face. He duly sank the 3 pointer to give Boston the win 118-115 and tie the series at 1-1. The teams now go back to Chicago for the Bulls two home game and you would think the Celtics would show the Bulls who’s boss. Unfortunately Leon Powe found out that he will be out for the rest of the play-offs with a torn ACL, another bad injury for the already weakened Boston.

In Game 2 the aforementioned Allen led the Celtics with 30 points while Rajon Rondo had a triple double with 19 points, 16 assists and 12 rebounds, a performance worthy of the play-offs. Glen Davis also had 26 and Kendrick Perkins 16 and 12 rebounds in a game where the Celtics bench didn’t do much work. On the other side Ben Gordon would have been disappointed that his massive 42 points couldn’t carry Chicago to their 2nd win in a row, Gordon hit 14 of 24 from the field including 6 three-pointers.

In the last game of the Monday night San Antonio won the second game of their series with the Mavericks 105-84 but the Mavericks will still be pleased to have taken one game back to Dallas, where the next two games will be played. In what turned out to be a blow out the Spurs restricted Dirk Nowitzki to only 14 points in a great defensive display. On the offensive side Tony Parker top scored with 38 points while Tim Duncan shrugged off any injury worries to get a double double with 13 points and 11 rebounds. A la the Chicago Bulls the Dallas Mavericks will be annoyed that they couldn’t replicate the intensity they played with in game 1 but they’ll still be pleased to be going home with a win under their belts especially as they’re very strong at home.

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On this Monday night there are only 2 games being played, Chicago look to do the impossible (or what most people thought was impossible) and take another game off of Boston in Boston while the game in the West is the 2nd home game for San Antonio against Dallas. San Antonio will still be hurting after their 105-97 loss at home on Saturday night which gave home court advantage to the Mavericks. The Mavericks largely did this by relying on their bench late on in the game and grinding down San Antonio, the only way you beat the Spurs.

San Antonio will hope to build some momentum and stop any more damage being done to their hopes of going deep into the post-season by beating Dallas tonight. They’ll be boosted by the full return of Jason Kidd, who didn’t practice before Saturday’s game and maybe as a result only managed 4 points. Despite the early loss in the series the Spurs are still heavily favoured in the press, it will be interesting to see whether they can tie the series up at 1 each or whether Dallas will have a chance at wrapping up the series at home in 5 days time. Tip off is at 9.30pm ET and the game is on TNT.

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The last 4 play-off series started on Sunday and everyone game went to the home team bar one.

First up in Los Angeles the Lakers easily beat the 8th seeded Utah Jazz 113-100 to take a 1-0 lead in the series. L.A were on top from the start and went into half time with a 22 point lead and while the Jazz did out score them by 9 in the 3rd quarter they were never in doubt. Kobe Bryant started his play-off run with a solid 24 points in 40 minutes on court. Kobe shot 9 of 17 from the field but arguably the best performance of the night came from his less flashy sidekick Pau Gasol. Gasol scored 20 points and just missed out on a double double with 9 rebounds, shooting 7 of his 11 shots from the field along with all 6 of his foul shots. With another their second home game of the series being played next the Lakers will hope to wrap this one up in 4 games which looks a distinct possibility the way Utah are playing.

Next up the biggest shock of the night as a 6th seed went to a 3rd seed and beat them for the second consecutive night. This time it was in the Eastern Conference at Orlando where Philadelphia inflicted some damage to Dwight Howard and his team. The ‘Sixers came back from 18 points down to win this one 100-98 thanks to an Andre Iguodala 2-point jumper with only 2.2 seconds left to play. Iguodala had 20 points, 8 rebounds and 8 assists while Lou Williams came off the bench to score 18. Despite hitting 11 of 13 from the field to drop 31 points on the night Dwight Howard couldn’t carry the Magic, who with this loss surrender the home court advantage they had.

In Atlanta the Hawks gave a performance worthy of a play-off place and the home court advantage they battled for all season as they beat the 5th seeded Miami Heat 90-64 in a blow out. Josh Smith and co. held Miami to their lowest points total of the season including only 7 points in the 4th quarter. Atlanta had a 20 point lead at half time and never looked back, Josh Smith top scored for the Hawks with 23 points and 10 rebounds for a double double while Joe Johnson dropped 15 to see the Hawks to a 1-0 lead in the best of 7 series.

Finally in Denver the 2nd seeded Nuggets showed why they were so high up in the regular season standings with a 29 point victory over the New Orleans Hornets, 113-84. Chauncey Billups led the Nuggets with 36 points and 8 assists while center Nene grabbed a double double with 12 points and 14 rebounds. Denver will look to wrap this one up in 4 or 5 games to give themselves some rest for the Conference Semi-Finals and after this display they will be confident that they can go into New Orleans and win at least one game.

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In the NBA tonight the remaining 4 ‘Game 1’s are being played tonight, Utah @ L.A Lakers, Philly @ Orlando, Miami @ Atlanta and New Orleans @ Denver. Orlando rested Dwight Howard and Hedo Turkoglu in the final games of the season which is why they lost games to teams like Milwaukee and Toronto but while both are questionable for tonight’s game they’ll both definitely play in an important game. The Magic cannot afford to go into the 2 76ers home games 1-1 because Philly are a strong team at home (24-17) and Iguodala and co. can make them pay wherever they play.

Orlando coach Stan Van Gundy will be looking for big performances from Howard and Rashard Lewis, two of the Magic’s mainstay throughout the season and if they can go into the 2 road games at 2-0 they will be confident that they can at least nick one and settle this game in 5 as a team that were way over .500 on the road in the regular season. Tip off is at 5.30pm ET and the game is being televised on TNT.

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Well while the baseball season has just started the NBA season is nearing it’s end, it’s the start of the play-offs today so instead of a recap of the MLB that was on offer last night we’ll be doing a preview of the best looking game on offer in the Conference Quarter-Finals.

Half of the 8 games are being played today starting in the Eastern Conference where the 7th placed Chicago Bulls are beginning their first round series with the Celtics in Boston before the Detroit Pistons will start what’s likely to be a short series against the Cleveland Cavaliers in Cleveland.

Then we move to the Western Conference and before the 4th/5th match up in Portland the most exciting series, in my opinion, begins in San Antonio where there’s the most chance of an early upset. The Dallas Mavericks ended the season strongly and as a result were able to leap frog the stumbling Utah Jazz and the misfiring New Orleans Hornets into 6th place in the West to set up a match between them and San Antonio. While the Spurs have home court advantage in this best of 7 series the Mavericks won’t be scared, San Antonio lost 13 games at home during the regular season including losses to Oklahoma City and Golden State, two bad, bad, teams in the West.

Compare this with Dallas’ record at home (32-9) and the Spurs will be hoping that they don’t slip up at home otherwise this game could go to a decider. It was only Dallas’ away form that held them back from challenging for a 3rd or 4th seed (18-23), however with Dirk Nowitzki firing on all cylinders the Mavs will hope to sneak an away victory and swing the series in their favour. The first two games of this series are being played at the AT&T Center so the Mavericks will hope to nick one of these two games before going back to Dallas for two games, if the series is tied at 2 after 4 games Dirk and co. will be happy.

The Spurs have been bolstered in recent days by the return of Manu Ginobili, who they hope will take some of the pressure off Tim Duncan, who in recent weeks has only been able to play 25 to 30 minutes a game after coming back from a knee injury. Game 1 of this series is on ESPN and tip-off’s at 8pm ET.

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The final day in the NBA was pretty meaningless for most of the teams, the only thing left to fight for was seedings in the play-offs so if your team weren’t already in the play-offs they were presumably reading holiday brochures at half time. However 13 games means a choc-a-block round up before this blog focuses on the baseball for a couple of days while waiting for the Conference Quarter Finals to begin. If you’re wondering why your team’s game hasn’t been featured in today’s round up it’s because the game was meaningless and frankly this writer doesn’t want to work on anything that’s pointless. J

After that trimming of the schedule it leaves us with 5 all important games to cover starting in Chicago where the Bulls picked the worst night to have a blow out defeat. Just when you wanted to end the season on a high and maybe get a better seed the Bulls accidentally lost very, very badly to the Toronto Raptors. At home. Not exactly play-off material and this could have repercussions on Chicago’s play-off hopes in general. A win last night would have seen them move up to 6th seed to face the Orlando Magic, a team they might have had a good chance against, however as 7th seed they are now confined to have to play the Boston Celtics, a much harder task.

They lost this one 109-98 at the United Center and Shawn Marion was the architect for the Raptors scoring 34 points and grabbing 11 rebounds for a double double while Chris Bosh scored 21 and grabbed 19 rebounds for his double double.

Next up in Cleveland there was another shock win with the Sixers beating the Cavs, who had only lost once at home all season, to gain 6th seed in the East and the right to play Orlando in the Quarter Finals. Philly kept the Cavs (minus LeBron who didn’t play any part) close all game and took this one into over time before winning 111-110. Andre Miller scored a team high 30 while Andre Iguodala scored 24 in a win that saw Philadelphia end the season .500, the same as Chicago but the 76ers held the season tie breaker so jumped above the Bulls.

We move into the Western Conference with the next game and the Dallas Mavericks ensured they’ll have a better chance at going deep into the post season by beating the Houston Rockets at home, 95-84. This win coupled with New Orleans’ loss meant that the Mavs climbed into 6th spot and will now face San Antonio in the first round. For Houston however, it means that they drop down to 5th spot to face Portland without home court advantage. Everything that could’ve got wrong for the Rockets went wrong last night, they lost, San Antonio won and Portland won meaning they tumbled down the rankings after things were looking so promising earlier in the day. Dirk Nowitzki again came up trumps for the Mavericks with 30 points and 15 rebounds for a double double while Jason Terry had 23 points from the bench.

Next to the aforementioned San Antonio where the Spurs beat the New Orleans Hornets to grab 3rd seed, home court advantage and the Southwest Division title. They will now face Dallas in the first round where as New Orleans, with this loss, are confined to play the Denver Nuggets. The Spurs won this one 105-98 and can thank Tony Parker for his instrumental part in the win, Parker had 29 points on the night and 6 assists while team mate Tim Duncan had a double double with 20 points and 19 rebounds.

Finally in Portland the ‘Blazers ensured they had home court advantage for at least one round of the post-season with a blow out win over Denver, 104-76. Denver didn’t play hard in this game since they were practically ensured 2nd place in the West and will play New Orleans in the first round. For Portland however they still needed to fight for their seeding, and so they did except it was their bench that did most of the fighting. The bench combined for 72 of the 104 Portland points with Travis Outlaw grabbing the most with 21 while Rudy Fernandez weighed in with 18 of his own. Portland will now play Houston in the first round with home court advantage which could prove vital for Brandon Roy and co.

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The biggest game tonight is between Houston and Dallas in Dallas. Houston can clinch their first division title in 15 years with a win over the Mavs and could finish as high as 2nd in the West if Denver slip up away to Portland. However if things go wrong and they lose they could fall as low as 5th and give up all important home court advantage as well as losing the division if San Antonio and Portland win (San Antonio are play at New Orleans).

As you can tell the Western Conference is tight and this applies to the Mavericks situation as well, if the Mavs win and New Orleans lose Dallas can pip the Hornets to the 6th seed. With L.A beating Utah last night it meant the Mavs could only finish 7th or higher, something that will please every Mavericks fan due to the fact that the Lakers have won 6 straight against Dallas.

Yao Ming is questionable for tonight’s game but everyone assumes with so much up for grabs the Rockets’ talisman will play, the same also goes to Josh Howard of the Mavericks. Houston will hope to replicate their early season win in Dallas to make sure they tie up the Southwest Division, they won by 10 points that day, 112-102. Tip off is at 8pm ET and the game is on ESPN.

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Only 3 games were played in the NBA on Wednesday in preparation for tonight’s end of season extravaganza.

In a match-up that’s likely to be repeated in 4 days time the Atlanta Hawks showed the Miami Heat some of what they can expect if they hold onto 5th place in the Eastern Conference. At the Philips Arena the Hawks won this one 81-79 in a game where the benches of each team got a lot of time on court, every player that was in uniform played some part in the game for both teams and due to this big numbers couldn’t really be put up by any individual player. Despite this Michael Beasley scored 23 points and 13 rebounds for Miami and Ronald Murray came off the Hawks’ bench to score 17 despite only shooting 5 of 20 from the field.

In Philadelphia the Boston Celtics powered past the 76ers with a 100-98 victory in another game that’s likely to be replicated in 4 days time. The men in green won this one due to Paul Pierce’s 31 points that led the Celtics while Tony Allen scored 18. This was likely to be Pierce’s last game before the play-offs (he’ll probably be rested for the home game against Washington tonight) so he made sure he had some form going into the post-season shooting 12 of 16 from the field including 7 of 9 from behind the arc.

Finally in L.A the Lakers warned the Jazz of what was likely to happen to them in under a week after beating them 125-112, and thus confining them to the 8th seed and a re-match in the Conference Quarter Finals. Andrew Bynum dropped a team high 22 points in half an hour on the court while Pau Gasol just missed out on a double double with 20 points and 9 rebounds. This was the Lakers’ last game and despite wanting to give their main players some time to find their rhythm before the play-offs started they gave all their players suited up some time on court at the Staples Center and will be confident of sweeping the Jazz in their upcoming series.

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The biggest game tonight is on the West Coast as the L.A Lakers play host to the Utah Jazz in a game that could be replicated in the first round of the play-offs unless Utah win. The Jazz have tiebreakers on their side so a win at the Staples Center tonight means that if New Orleans or Dallas lose their final games Utah will leapfrog them so 6th seed is still possible for a team that needs the highest seed it can get.

To have any chance of this though the Jazz, who have only won 2 games on the road against teams over .500, will need to beat a Lakers team that’s only lost 5 times at home all season and while L.A might want to rest some players for the upcoming post-season, they will also want to signal their intent to the Jazz.

To do this they’ll look to Kobe Bryant (averaging 27 points a game) to hit some shots early before possibly taking him out of the game. He’s isn’t the only Laker that will be looking to create some momentum going into the play-offs though, Pau Gasol (averaging 19) will want another double double to cap off a fine season in the yellow and purple uniform.

To make this task even harder of the Jazz they have significant injuries, C.J Miles is definitely out while Deron Williams and Mehmet Okur are both questionable to play in tonight’s game. Tip-off is at 10.30pm ET and the game’s on TNT.

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12 games were played in the NBA last night and a few things were wrapped up:

Starting in Indianapolis where the Cleveland Cavaliers secured the league’s best record with a win over the Pacers, 117-109. The Cavs will now have home advantage throughout the play-offs including the League Final and they won last night thanks to 37 points form LeBron James and 20 from Delonte West. Zydrunas Ilgauskas also got a double double with 16 points and 10 rebounds to see Cleveland to the win.

In Washington the Wizards gave up a 4 point lead to the Toronto Raptors with only 26 seconds left in the game to show why they’ve only won 19 games this season. Chris Bosh hit the game winning 3 pointer coolly to see the Raptors to a 97-96 win in their penultimate game of the season. Bosh ended the night with a double double combining 25 points with 15 rebounds and Toronto will hope for more of the same next season. The Wizards will want to make sure nothing unfortunate happens to Gilbert Arenas in the off-season so that they can make a push for the 2010 play-offs.

In Detroit Chicago made sure of at least 7th spot by winning beating the Pistons in a game that was called the “Avoid LeBron game”. Simply put whoever lost this was confined to face the Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference Quarter-Finals as the 8th seed. Chicago managed to avoid this and keep their hopes of a .500+ season alive thanks to Ben Gordon’s lay up in the final seconds to win this one 91-88. Gordon scored 19 on the night while Derrick Rose led the Bulls with 24. This win moved the Bulls up to 6th seed in the East with the team that they pushed down (Philadelphia) playing tonight.

In New Jersey the Nets gave their home fans one final win before the season ended with a 91-87 win over the Charlotte Bobcats. To be fair the Bobcats this game wasn’t taken that seriously by their coach Larry Brown and this was underlined by the fact that 5 bench players had over 10 minutes on court.

Brook Lopez led the Nets with 18 points and 20 rebounds while Vince Carter scored 17. New Jersey will be disappointed that they couldn’t get into the play-off this season as a team that were expected to make a push where as the Bobcats will be encouraged by the second half of their season that saw them come oh so close to a play-off place which wasn’t expected.

In Milwaukee an under strength Orlando team were dispatched by the Bucks 98-80 after a promising 1st quarter. Coming into Wisconsin without Dwight Howard, Hedo Turkoglu and J.J Redick the odds were firmly against the Magic but they were encouraged by the first 12 minutes which saw them enter the 2nd quarter with a 6 point lead.

However after that it was one way traffic, the Bucks outscored them by 13 to establish a 7 point lead going into the half, a lead that they didn’t give away. Charlie Villanueva came off the bench to score 18 while Richard Jefferson scored 24 points as a starter. A small mention goes to Malik Allen, who scored 9 points, shooting 100 percent in the process.

In Dallas the Mavs nearly cost themselves a chance at the 6th spot in the West and made the prospect of playing the Lakers in the first round nearly inevitable. They needed a jumper from Jason Terry to finish off the Minnesota Timberwolves with only 0.2 seconds to go to win this one 96-94. Terry came off the bench to score 22 points while Dirk Nowitzki led the Mavericks with 34 points as a starter. This win kept the Mavericks in 7th spot in the West and kept their hopes of beating New Orleans to the 6th spot alive with a game to play.

The aforementioned New Orleans Hornets scored a season low 66 points in a loss at the Houston Rockets, a loss that sees them having to fight for a 6th seed that looked almost certain a few weeks ago if not higher. This win leaves the Rockets one win away from the Southwest Division title and they’ll hope to complete their first division title since 1994 by beating Dallas on Wednesday. They won this one thanks to Yao Ming’s 22 points while Shane Battier dropped 10 to see the Rockets win this one 86-66 in a defensive battle.

In Denver the Nuggets easily beat the Sacramento Kings but had to overcome an 8 point 1st quarter deficit in the process. The Nuggets won this one 118-98 and in it J.R Smith scored a career high 45 points while hitting a franchise best 11 3 pointers for the majority of his points. With this win the Nuggets secure at least the 3rd seed in the Western Conference and can clinch 2nd with a win over Portland in a day’s time. Due to Smith’s outrageous behind the arc shooting a game that was become tense turned into a bit of a laugh with the Kings intentionally fouling him to stop him from shooting. This led to 8 foul shots, all of which he made.

In Utah the Jazz avoided their 4th straight loss with a win over the lowly Clippers but the damage to their play-off hopes were already done by the time the bad streak was over. The Jazz are now in 8th spot, something that didn’t seen at all possible a few months ago when they were riding high in the West but their poor away from and a few bad home losses put paid to their hopes of home court advantage.

They’re now left to scrap for 7th seed, something that they’re unlikely to get, and if they are unable to get it will have to face Kobe and the Lakers in the first round. The won this game 106-85 though, with a sterling contribution from Carlos Boozer, who had a double double (20-13rebounds) while Paul Millsap came off the bench to score 19 with 11 rebounds.

In Phoenix the Suns played their penultimate home game of the season and won 119-110 against the Memphis Grizzlies. With the Suns eliminated from the play-offs a few days ago they were just playing the season out and as a results gave quite a bit of time to their bench. Shaq, one of the starters, still managed to lead Phoenix in scoring despite this fact and dropped 19 with Steve Nash collecting a double double with 18 points and 12 assists to give the Suns a victory.

In Portland the Trail Blazers kept their hopes of the Western Conference 3rd seed with a blow out win over the Oklahoma City Thunder, 113-83. With this win Portland, Houston, and San Antonio go into their final games of the season with identical 53-28 records. The ‘Blazers easily won this one thanks to Travis Outlaw’s 21 points while Brandon Roy scored 20, shooting 7 of 10 from the field. Portland have to host Denver in their last game in a game that will decide whether they get 3rd, 4th or 5th seed.

Finally San Antonio kept their end of the 3 way tie for 3rd seed in the West with a 101-72 win at Golden State. The Spurs will play New Orleans in Texas on Wednesday and ensured they could still get the 3rd seed thanks to Drew Gooden’s contribution from the bench.

Gooden scored 20 points and 15 rebounds to help San Antonio to their 53rd win of the season while Tim Duncan also had a double double with 16 points and 13 rebounds. The Spurs also still have a shot at the Southwest Division title and are still battling with the Houston Rockets, another thing that will be decided on Wednesday.

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