Four in a Row; Raps beat Knicks by playing better than them.

Newsflash:  Playing good basketball wins games!  Somebody should tell Isaiah Thomas and the Knicks that having a bunch of good players won’t cut it in this NBA.  Teams like Phoenix, San Antonio, Detroit,  Dallas, Chicago, Utah, and Houston(and Toronto) will use their teamwork to outwork and outperform a team like New York.  I swear, the Knicks roster reminds me of when I was 14 and I would play NBA Live97 with Joell and Justin at Justin’s house and we would do a fantasy draft.  We’d pick at bunch of superstars and stack our team with mulitple guys playing the same position.  It didn’t work in that crappy videogame and it doesn’t work in real life.  Justin learned that the hard way.

Tonight we shot the ball very well–12/20 from three.  AP, Bargs, Garbo and Bosh all shot well over 50% from the field, and with TJ running around like a scary scary mouse, sneaking in and out of the defense and finding the open man, the Knicks didn’t stand a chance.  Ford finished with 18 points and 18 assists.  He is tearing teams apart lately, and I can’t wait to see him next year, when he and the team will be more used to one another.

It was a fun game to watch.  Very physical.  Calderon went down with a sprained ankle, as did AP (but he came back in), Bosh got elbowed in the head by Joey Graham (who Joey, Seany and I saw at the Paramount last night). Stevie Francis went down with some mystery injury too.  Kind of reminded me of the great rivalry we had with them back in 2000/2001, with the whole Vince vs. Houston, and Oak vs. everybody in the stadium.

Raps win in OT in front of Tony, other fans.

I was treated to a great overtime win yesterday afternoon as the Raptors beat the Sonics 120-119. There may have been some other people there too.

Hoo Betty! This was a game that featured about a dozen big time shots; the kind that make Chuck shout about onions. Overall though, aside from the big shots, this wasn’t a pretty game. The Sonics are not a good team, yet they out-rebounded us baaadly (52-34) and generally out-hustled us. At times, it seemed we could get nothing on their ‘D’–which they aren’t known for. Yeah, they had a hot hand for most of the night-primarily because Ray Allen is just freakin’ amazing at putting the ball in the basket — but, we were plodding around on offence, not giving ourselves enough easy buckets. Oh, and I think they absolutely murdered us with second-chance points (2CP).

It was definitely good to see AP back after missing 5 with a sprained ankle, though he ceratainly wasn’t playing at 100%. He missed a couple of wide-open threes, and his ‘D’ was a little soggy. In the end, it was Dixon’s (who hadn’t played with Parker yet) defence that came up big for us, as he stripped the ball from Watson/Wilkins/I can’t remember with only second left in OT-a play that basically sealed the win for us.

Bosh had a solid game, but I felt we needed him to take command earlier than he did. He didn’t really step it up until late in the fourth, when we were down by about 7, though he was the key to us tying the game. There was that one incredible play in the fourth where he went behind his back to lay one in over Petro, then zipped back down the court to block the shit out of Watson’s lay-up. I dropped my jacket when he did that. Still, he had Collison and Wilcox covering him all-night, and neither of those guys can keep up with him. I was expecting him to score 30 on those goofs in the second half alone.

Bargnani is a freak.

Ford had a great game, coming up huge in OT. For a player who’s been struggling like he has with his offencive game to take so many jump-shots in overtime is a gutsy move, and he’s got the skill to do that every night I think. That short-to-mid range pull-up he takes is solid, and he can get it every time down the court. And, when that’s falling for him, he’s just plain impossible to defend, because when the ‘D’ comes in on him he can use his hilarious speed and quicks to just slither through to the rim. He also dished out 13 dimes, many of which were on Bosh’s late spurt in the fourth and OT.

I may have pulled the Salami and Cheese out a little early last night — it was 69-71 for Seattle in the 3rd quarter — but I think that shows a brashness that Swirksy would both fear and envy, and Leo would buy me dinner or shoes or both.

Raps win, I like Juan Dixon.

The Raps won their tilt with the Grizzlies 94-87, but I missed the game because of my dad’s birthday celebrations. This consisted mostly of me eating too much, and my sister taking a bet to slap a fork with cake on it across her forehead for 5  bucks.

Anyhow, from what I can tell, we won by playing very aggressive defence and putting the ball on the floor and attacking the basket.  The stat that jumps out at me as I look at the boxscore is the 7 blocks we recorded.  Bosh has been great defensively lately, using his length and quickness to alter shots and get his hands on some.  I saw the highlights and he had a wicked one that he spiked off the backboard. That was nice.  Jeez,  I’m struggling here.  Oh right, Juan Dixon!  He’s looking good to me man.  Chuck and Leo keep talking about how he doesn’t tend to take bad shots, scoring his points within the flow of the game.  I agree with that observation, as he seems to score 12, 14, 17 points, all within the flow of the game.  He, like Anthony Parker, isn’t necessarily someone who’s going to take over a game.  He’s a good scorer that can really hurt a defence if they forget about him, and his D is solid.  Colangelo got this guy for Jones, who although he’s a good player, wasn’t into what this team is trying to do.  Great trade.

Bargnani had a great game again, scoring 18 on 7-13 shooting.  He’s showing so much focus, playing great ball despite going to Italy this weekend to deal with his grandfather’s ill health.

Anyone who actually saw the game is welcome to add some real insight.

I kind of want to see The Hills Have Eyes 2.

That’s all for now.  Stay tuned (well, not tuned) for an upcoming piece by Dave about his shinny hockey league.  Insurance agents playing hockey! WAMMO!

Leafs and Raps lose.

I don’t want to talk about it right now.

That is all.

Kaberle out 1-2 weeks, Janssen suspended 3 games.

What a load of shit that was.  Kaberle could’ve been killed on an absolutely blatant hit last night in Jersey, and the refs kept their whistles silent.  I don’t know if I’ve ever been so disgusting with officiating as I’ve found myself lately. First there was Sundin’s disallowed goal against the Islanders, then the high stick that cut his lip in the Montreal game, where he was spitting blood onto the ice in front of the refs who still refused to give a high-sticking penalty on the play.  And now this disgusting non-call.  I still can’t believe what the refs were thinking.  Look, if they didn’t see it they didn’t see it (though I find it amazing that they didn’t), but what I don’t understand is what kind of statement the NHL makes about the game when a blatant dirty hit like that goes ‘unnoticed’ in the game.  Yes, Janssen (I don’t even care if I’ve spelled his name wrong) got suspended for 3 games, but not nearly enough in my opinion.  And anyone who thinks that this is a Leafs fan being too sensitive about one of his players can kiss my ass. That was a dirty and dangerous hit, and I wouldn’t want to see it happen to anyone.  That it would be Kaberle on the other end, someone who doesn’t rely on physicality and violence as a part of his game, makes me a little sick.

The Leafs won.

A change is gonna come.

It was pointed out to me by someone who loves to point that this internetwebsite has turned into a bunch of game recaps, that although appropriate, are not really the point of having a forum to discuss sports. So, I promise that from now on I’m going to do my best to occasionally include some other sports related insights, opinions, or even stories, just to mix things up a little bit. Up first…uncover Birby, the mysterious game of Riverdale boys that requires very little running and can be played in dress socks with no shoes on! Stay tuned!

Also, on a unrelated note, you all absolutely have to check out Dave’s ’songstory’ audio blog. I highly, highly, highly, recommend you listen to the Bilal track that’ll be just a quick scroll from the top of the page, and titled ‘Letters to Bilal’ (the Phillip Glass song is actually quite good too, and the write up by Adam is absolutely gold). To get to the site just click on ’songstory’ to the right here –> under the the ‘links’ section on this page. When you get there you can scroll to the song write up you wish to check out, and at the bottom of the write up there’ll be a button that says ‘play in popup’. Click that and the song will play without having to download it– you can even listen to it while visiting other websites–amazing! (sorry, I know most of you are better at this internet stuff than I am, but most of what can be done with this magical internet still baffles me).

Raps win, crush Rockets 106-90

The Raptors beat the Houston Rockets 106-90 in a lopsided match that silenced criticisms that surfaced after Monday night’s 16 point loss to the Spurs.  Though they’ve been playing great basketball for more than a month now, the thourough beating they received from the Spurs had some people around the league saying the Raptors were clearly not ready to tango with the big boys of the West.

The Rockets are not only a top 5 team, but alos lead the league in opponent FG%, making them arguably the best defensive team in the NBA.  However, you’d never known it by watching last night’s game, as the Raps shot the lights out, including 8-14 from 3.  Ball distribution was greatly improved from last game, with 26 assists and just 9 turnovers.  We also did a good job on the glass, outrebounding the Yao-less (broken leg) Rockets 36-33.

The big story in tonight’s game was the play of our bench. With Anthony Parker out of the lineup with a sprained ankle, and MoPete slated to take his spot in the starting line-up, we needed the bench to step up and provide some scoring.  Bargnani was his usual, mind-blowing self, shooting 4-5 from three, and finishing with 20 absolutely effortless points.  Calderon had another solid game, abusing Rafer Alston on ‘D’ and dishing out 6 assists.  Most surprising of all was the play of Kris Humphries.  He came off the bench and played a tough, and far less erratic game than I had expected, finishing with 16 gritty points and 6 boards.  Like Dave said, nobody looked more surprised by the play of Kris Humphries than Kris Humphries.

Bosh vowed to bounce back with a good game after his performance in San Antonio, and though he finished with only 13 points, he had a solid all-round performance.  He grabbed 9 boards, and most importantly, dished out 6 assists.  He shot  an efficient 5-9 while ensuring his teammates were involved.  I doubt Houston was expecting Bosh to give the ball up as much as he did, and this must have thrown off their defensive game-plan.

As long as we don’t go on any prolonged losing streaks, and keep winning a road game here and there, we should finish near the top of the East, and have tons of momentum heading into the playoffs. At which point Joell and Dave and I will have to either fly back to Canada to watch the games, or spend rediculous amounts of money to watch the games on the internet or something.

Spurs beat up Raps, 107-91

I’m almost thankful to MLSE for being such greedy bastards because I didn’t get to watch the Raps get torn apart by San Antonio.   I should quickly point out that beating San Antonio in San Antonio is like beating Ben a connect four: it ain’t gonna happen, and if it does, something horrible must have gone wrong. I saw not a single minute of the game, but from the box-score I can tell a few things:

-Bosh was off his game for whatever reason–Duncan probably had something to do with this.  He only went to the line 4 times, and when Bosh only goes to the line 4 times it means he’s either settling for outside shots that aren’t dropping, or he’s shooting the lights out.  We know it wasn’t the latter, because he shot 6-16 from the field, and finished with 14 points, 9 rebounds, 4 assists, and 2 blocked shots.

-Guys we rely on for  points, like AP and Peterson had a combined 5 points while going 2-10 from the field and taking only 1 three-pointer between the two of them.  When this happens, we really need guys like Garbo, Ford, Bargnani and Calderon to step up.

-Bargnani seems to be the only one to do so.  I was following the game by checking the live stats on NBA.com every 15 minutes or so and noticed that there was a point in the 3′rd quarter where Bargnani caught fire and hit a few threes in the span of about 5 minutes.  He also continued his recent trend of grabbing boards, getting 6 of em’ last night (his season average sat barely above 3 before this recent stretch of games-now it’s up near 4).  He’s going to have to finish the season with close to 12 ppg and around 5 rpg (and the Raps in the playoffs) if he’s going to take the Rookie of the Year away from Brandon Roy.

-We didn’t move the ball around well for a team that has so many capable passers.  Beyond Calderon, Ford and Bosh (8, 5, and 4 assists respectively), nobody had more than 1 assist.  This includes guys like AP, MoPete, Garbo, and Dixon, all guys who are more than capable of dishing out the ball.  What does this tell you?  They weren’t playing the team game they win with-the one that sets the pace of the game early and keeps the opponents defence on its heels.

-Rasho had another great game (on the stat sheet at least), finishing with 16 points and 9 rebounds.  However, I imagine he helped Bosh guard Duncan (or maybe even spent more time than Bosh guarding him), and Duncan finished with a monster game of 24 points on 11-15 shooting, 16 boards, 4 assists, and 4 blocks.

-We also got out-rebounded (41-31), shot just 68% from the stripe, and 42% from the field, while allowing them to shoot 53%.

In conclusion, San Antonio is a damn good team that kicked our buts in almost every aspect of this game.  I’m confident though, that when we play our team game with confidence, we can challenge these guys and maybe steal a win.

Leafs lose 5-4 to the Habs

The Leafs lost to Montreal 5-4  in what ended up being a dizzying game that went down to the last second.

Less than two minutes after Battaglia potted his 11th for the Leafs only a few minutes into the first to open scoring, the Habs responded and I was dizzy from there on. While it seemed to me the Leafs were trying to catch up to the Canadiens pace for the entire first period, they did a better job of setting the tone themselves in the second half of the second period, and proceeded to dominate the third. Aebischer was on his heels for much of the game, and was lucky to escape with the win. Raycroft look very shaky, letting in a couple of weak goals while making less than a handful of key saves.

I enjoyed watching new call-up Jeremy Williams play, as he looks like a smooth skating sniper with a bit of an edge to him. I expected to see a timid fancy boy - almost like Wellwood - but instead he showed some grit in his limited ice time. Williams, who wears a number I can’t remember seeing on a Leafs team (48), scored the Leafs 3rd goal early in the 3rd period, bringing his NHL career total to 2 goals on 3 shots. Not a bad start.

The game ended on a sour note though. After a crazy non-call on what was clearly a penalty on Sundin (he was spitting blood onto the ice in front of the refs after getting a stick to the mouth), the Leafs tried pouring on the pressure with Aubin pulled and the extra attacker on. We almost had ourselves set up in their zone until McCabe showed brilliant consistency and mishandled a pass at the point, and ate up a few precious seconds trying to set things up again. Oh, but it’s okay: he made up for it by punching some guys after the game was over. Yes, I know he scored the second goal of the game and it was a good shot, but I’d trade all of his points for even an average amount of hockey sense in that man.

This loss hurts the Leafs, not just because of the points we didn’t get, but because of the psychological toll this inconsistency can take on their confidence.

Come out my little chickies.

Now I happen to know that there are a few of you out there who check this site, and read my little reports here, but have yet to make any comments. It should be pretty obvious by now that I’m not discouraged by the lack of participation, but I just want to remind you all that you are more than welcome to jump in and make yourselves heard.  It certainly doesn’t have to be sports related insight, just a comment about anything you might feel should be noted.  Constructive criticism is always welcome, though I should warn you I will silently hold a grudge against whoever makes it.

I also should remind you that I’m always willing to accept any and all submissions of any kind.  It can be non-sports stuff, sports stuff or non-sports stuff.  See how this works?  I’m cool and wacky people, come on and join the party!