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The Toronto Raptors came into these playoffs with a well-known “LeBron Stopper” on the roster in DeMarre Carroll. The Hawks got swept by the Cavs when Carroll played the role for Atlanta in 2015, and James averaged 26.0 points, 8.5 rebounds, and 6.7 assists on 62.2 percent shooting when the Cavs beat Carroll’s Raptors…
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Kyle Lowry was on the bench with a sprained ankle yesterday while his team got punted out of the playoffs by LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers for a second consecutive season. Lowry knew the Raptors’ season was over after they lost Game 3 on Friday night, and he was feeling existential afterwards.
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In his “Coach’s Corner” bit after the first quarter of last night’s Game 4 between the Celtics and the Wizards, Boston coach Brad Stevens explained to TNT’s David Aldridge how his team had shrugged off an early Washington run to end the period leading 24-20. “Even when it was 8-0 them,” he said, “we were playing way…
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For the second year in a row, the Cavaliers have handily disposed of the Raptors in the playoffs; this year, handily is an understatement there.
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Kevin Durant has had it tonight with the Jazz mascot, angrily telling it off and earning a flagrant foul for shoving Gobert late in the game. Durant also had words with a man in a bear costume, depicted above.
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The NBA will reportedly be suspending Kelly Oubre for one game after he shoved Kelly Olynyk during Thursday’s Game 3 between the Wizards and Celtics.
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First of all, as a basketball euphemism, physical play is bullshit. Everything that happens on a basketball court is physical play. A bounce-pass is a physical play. When broadcast crews and halftime pundits and bloggers say that one team is playing more physical than the other, particularly in the playoffs, what they…
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So far the story of the second-round series between the Cavs and the Raptors is the degree to which the Cavs are completely unbothered by their opponents. Here’s the series summed up, in one image:
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Things got chippy early in the second quarter for the Celtics and Wizards, after Kelly Oubre was the victim of a hard screen by Kelly Olynyk. Oubre wasn’t especially pleased, and he showed it by charging Olynyk and shoving him to the ground:
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Is Wizards forward Markieff Morris only playing through an ankle injury because his brother Marcus is impersonating him? Let’s see what Marcus thinks.
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Remember that shit from the first round of the playoffs? That shit is still going on, and I still hate it.
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During the fourth quarter of the Spurs’ game against the Rockets, Spurs point guard Tony Parker came down funny after shooting a teardrop and immediately crumpled to the floor. It initially appeared that he hurt his right knee, but it now seems that he hurt his left leg while taking off for the floater. Parker…
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For the second consecutive postseason, it has become abundantly clear that the Toronto Raptors are going to get owned by the Cleveland Cavaliers.
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This isn’t meant to denigrate Isaiah Thomas, who fucked the Wizards all the way up last night and is proving himself to be the True Superstar nobody thought the Celtics had, but oh my God, can you imagine how aggravating it must be to get 53 points dropped on you by a guy who is about the size of Tom Cruise?
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The Boston Celtics won a game in which they trailed for pretty much all but a few moments of regulation, to take a 2-0 lead in their best-of-seven Eastern Conference semifinal series against the Washington Wizards. Celtics guard Isaiah Thomas was unstoppable in the fourth quarter and overtime, scoring 29 of his 53…
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You can’t double team Steph Curry on the perimeter. If you go under the screen against him, you are allowing maybe the greatest shooter of all time an open look. You can switch a big guy onto him, but that means Steph gets to go at a larger, slower defender. Maybe it’s not that bad if that big guy is Rudy Gobert, the…
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The Wizards tried everything against Isaiah Thomas tonight. They threw taller defenders at him, they tried trapping him on pick-and-rolls, they tried switching on him, they tried hitting him. Nothing worked. The puny Celtics star got into the best point guard duel of the playoffs with John Wall and came out on the…
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Dahntay Jones signed a veteran’s minimum contract with the Cavaliers on the very last day of the regular season, meaning that his prorated salary for the year was $9,127. The 36-year-old earned three garbage-time minutes at the end of last night’s win over the Raptors, and in those three minutes he managed to dunk a…
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The ever-steady San Antonio Spurs were supposed to present a stiff challenge to the Rockets. Instead, they got cooked, broken down, and eaten by a ravenous Rockets team without putting up a fight.
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The Cavs may have had their troubles almost blowing leads against the Pacers, yet they still swept Indiana away and got a week off before their second round series against the Raptors. Indiana gave the Cavs more trouble than they anticipated, but LeBron James remains untouchable so it sort of didn’t matter. The…
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The Warriors recently put the finishing touches on a sweep of the Portland Trail Blazers, and they had to wait almost a full week to find out whether they’d be playing the Clippers or the Jazz in the second round. A Warriors-Jazz series is a much more interesting prospect, because even if the Clippers and Warriors…
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Are the Cavs a bit rusty after an eight-day layoff between the first round and the second?
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The Los Angeles Clippers got eliminated on their home court by the Utah Jazz yesterday, in Game 7. The Jazz were the lower-seeded team, so nominally this qualifies as an upset—though of course it wasn’t really, in the dual sense that, A) even before the Clippers lost Blake Griffin to a season-ending toe injury in Game…
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Who knew that teeth hampered your offensive ability? Isaiah Thomas came alive after losing a front chomper, waking up the Celtics offense en route to a quick 12 first-quarter points.
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Midway through the fourth quarter last night, it looked as if the Bucks might pull off a nifty comeback and force a Game 7 after being down by double digits for much of the second half. They did not.
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After a Game 4 loss, Bulls coach Fred Hoiberg accused refs of ignoring Isaiah Thomas’s carrying. “He had a hell of a game tonight. But when you’re allowed to discontinue your dribble on every possession, he is impossible to guard. He’s impossible to guard when you’re able to put your hand underneath the ball and take…
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With a little less than a minute left in last night’s Game 5 between Washington and Atlanta, John Wall dribbled into some open space behind a Marcin Gortat screen and calmly sank a 21-foot jumpshot, giving the Wizards a four-point lead with 47 seconds left to play.
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The Boston Celtics regained control of their first-round series against the Bulls last night, winning 108-97 and taking a 3-2 series lead. Who is to blame for the Bulls losing their grip? Not Dwyane Wade, who scored 26 points, grabbed 11 rebounds, dished eight assists, and played some inspired defense in the loss.
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The first four games of the Celtics-Bulls series made no sense. The road team won all four games and season-long trends gave way to puzzling single-game outcomes. Celtics winger Jaylen Brown hardly saw the court despite a solid rookie season. Rajon Rondo spent all year switching back and forth between starter and…
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The Houston Rockets won Game 5 over the Thunder tonight, shooting their way out of a handful of Russell Westbrook-induced holes and taking a close one, 105-99. Much like the entire series, the game was excruciating to watch and the Thunder’s brief flickers of life did little to stave off the feeling that they were…
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