Basketball

• Jordan Clarkson First Jazz Player to Win Sixth Man Award

  May 25, 2021 SportZ 0 Comments

  Source: ESPN "Jordan Clarkson first Utah Jazz player to win NBA Sixth Man award; teammate Joe Ingles 2nd in voting"

  Utah Jazz guard Jordan Clarkson was named the NBA's Sixth Man of the Year on Monday night, edging out teammate Joe Ingles and New York Knicks guard Derrick Rose for the award.

  With the unique circumstances of both Clarkson and Ingles being among the finalists for the award, TNT used Ingles to help give his teammate the award. After going through a couple of trivia questions about the history of the award, host Ernie Johnson asked them both how many members of the Jazz had won the award before.

  Clarkson said zero -- while Ingles, who knew this year's results, held up his index finger and then grabbed the trophy, handing it to a stunned Clarkson as he accepted the award.

  Clarkson, who has played for the Los Angeles Lakers and Cavaliers in addition to the Jazz over the course of his seven-year NBA career, averaged a career-high 18.4 points, 4.0 rebounds and 2.5 assists in 26.7 minutes in 68 games during the 2020-21 regular season. He received 65 of the 100 first-place votes cast by the global panel of 100 sportswriters and broadcasters who vote for all of the league's various season-long awards.

  Clarkson's 407 points put him significantly ahead of Ingles, who had 34 first-place votes and 272 total points. Rose had the remaining first-place vote and finished with 77 total points, slightly ahead of Dallas Mavericks guard Jalen Brunson (67 points) in fourth.

  Utah, meanwhile, will try to even its first-round series with Memphis on Wednesday night, after the top-seeded Jazz lost at home to the eighth-seeded Grizzlies on Sunday night in a game Donovan Mitchell missed after the team's doctors held him out because of a sprained ankle.

  Jordan Clarkson's accolade, though, is just a testament to the depth of Utah's line-up. According to Clarkson, the team is undeterred in its chase for a different trophy -- the Larry O'Brien Championship Trophy -- over the next couple of months.

   

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• The Lakers vs Warriors was a Nail-biter Game

  May 20, 2021 SportZ 0 Comments

  Source: ESPN "NBA playoffs 2021: LeBron James and Stephen Curry's play-in performance was the playoff prelude everyone hoped for"

   

  By all accounts, the play-in tournament has been a resounding success for the NBA this year. It created exciting new scenarios toward the end of the regular season and mostly stemmed the widespread tanking that had made a mockery of the final month of play for the 14 teams that weren't making the playoffs.

  And it gave us a delicious matchup between the Los Angeles Lakers and Golden State Warriors on Wednesday night at Staples Center.

  The game was an instant classic, with two of the league's brightest stars, Stephen Curry and LeBron James, matching each other with brilliant performances and clutch shot-making that felt more like one of their classic NBA Finals matchups than the play-in game to get to the actual playoffs.

  James got the better of Curry on Wednesday, hitting a 34-foot 3-pointer over him to seal the Lakers' 103-100 win. The trey was the longest go-ahead shot in the final three minutes of a game in James' career, according to ESPN Stats & Information research.

  James finished with 22 points, 11 rebounds and 10 assists for his 128th career triple-double (including regular season, play-in and playoffs).

  The Lakers' win gives them the No. 7 seed in the Western Conference and a first-round playoff matchup against the second-seeded Phoenix Suns. And it drops the Warriors, now fighting for the 8-seed, into an elimination game Friday against the Memphis Grizzlies (9 p.m. ET on ESPN).

  It's fair to question if the reward for all that excitement is worth the risk of potentially losing one of the league's marquee franchises before the playoffs officially begin. The Warriors now have less than 48 hours to regroup before facing the Grizzlies in San Francisco. It is a bit redundant from the Warriors' regular-season finale win over Memphis on Sunday that determined the eighth seed in the play-in tournament.

  In any other year, that win would have sent the Warriors into a first-round series against the top-seeded Utah Jazz. But this year, they'll have to play two extra games, one of which is an elimination game, just to advance to the same series.

  When considering this, it's easy to see why some fans may have gripes about this new format. Even LeBron himself has stated that whoever came up with the play-in tournament "needs to be fired". Like all new things, it will take a while to get used to this new format, but when we do, assuming it's permanent, it has the potential to be an exciting and suspenseful prelude to the post-season. It's already showing signs of that, as shown by this game.

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• 2021 NBA Play-In Tournament - The Mix

  May 17, 2021 SportZ 0 Comments

  

   

  With yesterday being the last day of this year's 72-game NBA season, the next thing fans have to look forward to on the schedule is the play-in tournament, which officially starts tomorrow, May 18th. This is the first season where they're implementing this format, which grants an extra opportunity for teams who would ordinarily be out of the playoff picture by now.

  Here's how it works: the 7th, 8th, 9th, and 10th seeded teams for each conference will compete for the last two spots in this year's postseason. The 7th seed and the 8th seed will play each other, with the winner claiming a spot in the playoffs, and the 9th and 10th seed will play each other, with the loser being eliminated. The loser of the first game and the winner of the second game will then play each other for the eighth and final spot.

  For the Eastern conference, the teams who wound up in this year's play-in tournament are the Charlotte Hornets at 10th, the Indiana Pacers at 9th, the Washington Wizards at 8th, and the Boston Celtics at 7th. The Celtics in particular are a surprising addition; most fans certainly wouldn't have expected them to land the 7th seed with a .500 record at the beginning of the season, just coming off a conferences finals appearance, but here they are. Meanwhile, the Hornets and the Wizards also have a shot at making the playoffs, for the first time in quite a few years.

  For the Western conference, the teams who made the tournament are the San Antonio Spurs at 10th, the Memphis Grizzlies at 9th, the Golden State Warriors at 8th, and the Los Angeles Lakers at 7th. The Warriors missed last year's playoffs due to Curry and Klay Thompson being out with injuries; Klay is still out, but the team has bounced back with Steph at the helm. The Lakers, on the other hand, were by no means expected to be here – the defending champs with a roster straight out of 2k who debatably got a better roster in the off-season, at least on paper, are now fighting just for a playoff appearance. But things happen – injury, chemistry issues – especially since both LeBron and AD were out extensively this season. Portland's win against Denver last night was what ultimately cemented them in the play-in tournament.

  Everyone has their predictions, but what this season has taught me, with the Knicks in the fourth seed and the Jazz with the best record in the league, is that anything can happen. The play-in tournament starts tomorrow evening with the Wizards @ Celtics and the Hornets @ Pacers.

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• BallCourt - NBA Playoff Seatings | Hip Hop Rapper J Cole turns Pro | Russell Westbrook Reaches The Great O | Lamelo Ball

  May 12, 2021 CWN Publisher 0 Comments

  The World of Basketball w Coach Drew - this week, Drew invites Malik Spann from the Blitz Sports Magazine Podcast on the set.  They chop it up about all things basketball.  

  Topics include:    

  ◦    Playoff picture clearing up as Play in Tournament approaches
  ◦    Russell Westbrook reaches Oscar Robertson's record breaking levels

  ◦     Has Melo done enough to garner the ROY trophy.
  ◦    J. Cole has  gone pro
  ◦    Word from our Coach: Focus on the Fundamentals

  ◦   Revisiting the importance of HBCU's 

  Click on the image above to listen to the full podcast.

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• BallCourt - Lamelo Returns | LaMarcus Aldridge Retires | Aye Nike, Mamba Out!

  May 3, 2021 CWN Publisher 0 Comments

  This week on BallCourt - The World of Basketball, Coach Drew talks about the changing faces and business partnerships in the NBA.   Vanessa Bryant's decision to end a longstanding relationship with Nike shakes up the game.   Additional topics include:

  ◦    Brooklyn Nets  LaMarcus Aldridge calls it a career.
  ◦    Return of La Melo.
  ◦    A Coaches Look
      ◦    How Spicy is Curry looking?
      ◦    Lynx release Lexie Brown
  ◦   Word from our Coach : The failures of AAU. By Kendrick Perkins
  Kendrick Perkins goes off on AAU basketball: ‘It’s not even about basketball anymore.

  Click the image above to listen to the full podcast.

   

  
  Stay active,  Stay Healthy , Stay Safe

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