Welcome to PBT’s roundup of the day in NBA action. Or, what you missed while watching a guy do a backflip on a surfboard….
Thunder 120, Rockets 98: Welcome back to Oklahoma City James Harden. After a warm reception from the crowd Harden was 3-of-16 shooting and struggled to defend Kevin Durant (who doesn’t?). And despite that the Rockets biggest problem was team defense. Brett breaks the game down for you here.
Wizards 84, Trail Blazers 82: The Wizards win! The Wizards win! Theeeeee Wizards win! But man it was ugly. This was our other game of the night and we broke it down as well.
Nets 95, Celtics 83: The Nets with this one on a technical knock out.
Boston lost this game before the fight that sent Rajon Rondo, Kris Humphries and Gerald Wallace to the showers just before halftime.
Boston lost this early. Kevin Garnett played the first 5:19 of the game and it was 14-9 Boston when KG went out Doc Rivers subbed him out with Chris Wilcox. The Nets immediately went on a 19-6 run and even when Garnett returned he couldn’t stop it and it grew into a 38-12 run. This game was over before Rondo stepped in to protect KG.
What should worry Celtics fans right now is the 22nd ranked defense in the league. Well, that and the healthy suspension about to come down on Rondo for instigating that fight.
Pistons 117, Suns 77: How can a team lose by 40 to the Pistons? Good question. Brett Pollakoff tried his best to answer it for us.
Knicks 102, Bucks 88: My favorite fans of the night were in Milwaukee, where they chanted “Brooklyn’s better” when Carmelo Anthony was shooting free throws.
Unfortunately the Bucks were not playing anywhere near the Nets level. They had no good answer for stopping Carmelo Anthony, who had 29 points on just 18 shots. And it was a night of key Knicks being efficient shooters with Tyson Chandler getting 17 points on 4-of-4 shooting, and Steve Novak dropped 19 points on 10 shots. The Knicks took control with a 9-0 run right before the half then a 10-0 run early in the third quarter. And Wednesday the Bucks had no amazing comebacks in them.
Bulls 101, Mavericks 78: Tom Thibodeau finally trusted his bench and they rewarded him with 50 points and an easy win over Dallas. Nate Robinson led the way for the bench, getting 14 points on 5-of-6 shooting. The Bulls also continued to play good defense, holding the Mavs to 34.6 percent shooting. Dallas really could use that Nowitzki guy back on offense.
Clippers 101, Timberwolves 95: Chauncey Billups was back and played nearly 20 minutes, and that was good to see. But the Clippers won this because they played good defense again in the second half — Minnesota shot just 25.6 percent as a team in the final 24. Kevin Love was off all night against the Clippers 3-of-12 shooting. DeAndre Jordan had 15 points and played well.
Jazz 96, Hornets 84: The Jazz pulled away in the third quarter and got the kind of comfortable win behind 19 points from Al Jefferson that should have the team smiling. But the Jazz may have lost Marvin Williams for a little while after his head hit the floor hard late in the third quarter, which led Utah to talk about a likely concussion after the game.
Grizzlies 103, Raptors 82: In the third quarter Utah shot 72.2 percent as a team with Marc Gasol and Zach Randolph combining for 15 points on 6-of7 shooting. Meanwhile Toronto shot 23.5 percent in the third quarter. Memphis won the third quarter by 18 points and made the fourth quarter basically meaningless. By the way, good on Mike Conley for out playing Kyle Lowry for the night — Lowry usually gets up for this matchup (remember it was Conley’s presence that had Memphis moving Lowry). Conley had 16 on the night.
Spurs 110, Magic 89: Manu Ginobili had 12 points in the first quarter, going 4-of-4 from three and sparking a 13-0 San Antonio run where they took a comfortable lead and the game was never really in doubt from there. San Antonio essentially did whatever they wanted, got whatever shots they wanted and met with little resistance. Did you expect otherwise? Ginobili had 20 points, Gary Neal 19.
Hawks 94, Bobcats 90: Ben Gordon almost won the Bobcats this game — he went off for 20 points in the fourth quarter and single handedly made this a game. The Hawks were up by 7 inside of 2:30 in the game but Gordon kept sinking contested threes. The Bobcats had a chance to win it with 5.2 seconds left, getting the ball down 1, and to tie it a few seconds later, but in both cases the Hawks — we’re looking at you Josh Smith — did a good job of denying a clean entry pass to Gordon. And that was enough. Smith, Al Horford and Lou Williams each had 17 for the Hawks.
