Inside Hoops – Page 1396 – NBA Blog

Tip-in from Marc Gasol lifts Grizzlies over Thunder in OT

Marc Gasol and the Memphis Grizzlies finally put away Oklahoma City with their final shot.

In a matchup of Western Conference contenders that had a playoff feel to it, Gasol tipped in Zach Randolph’s miss with less than a second left in overtime Wednesday night to give Memphis a 90-89 win over the Thunder.

Gasol was so excited about the winning basket that he dropped a not-suitable-for-television expletive in the live postgame interview.

”I saw Zach going baseline and just went for the rebound and got lucky with the tip,” Gasol said. ”It’s an emotional game. It’s a team that we like playing against, and a team that knows us very well. It was a gritty game.” …

”We win in a variety of ways. It’s never pretty,” said Mike Conley, who led the Grizzlies with a season-high 24 points. ”That’s that grit-and-grind motto right there. We just find a way to win however it is. (This) was one of those wins.”

Randolph added 15 points and 18 rebounds, giving him 7,001 career rebounds, while Gasol had 14 points and 15 rebounds.

Kevin Durant led the Thunder with 32 points, including 15 in the third quarter to help Oklahoma City take its first lead. Westbrook scored 20 on 7-of-25 shooting from the field. Kevin Martin added 17 points, but no other Thunder player had more than seven.

— Reported by Clay Bailey of the Associated Press

Byron Mullens lifts Bobcats over Raptors 107-101

Gerald Henderson is enjoying the best streak of his four-year NBA career, and the Charlotte Bobcats are playing better, too.

Henderson turned in another solid all-around game, Byron Mullens scored 25 points and the Bobcats beat the Toronto Raptors 107-101 on Wednesday night to win consecutive games for the first time since mid-November.

Henderson scored 21 points on 8-of-14 shooting and added seven rebounds and five assists. The soon-to-be restricted free agent is averaging 22.7 points on 50 percent shooting in his last seven games, including a 35-point performance in a win over Boston on March 12.

But he’s more willing to talk about the team’s recent improvement than his own personal accomplishments.

”I think it’s just us maturing,” Henderson said. ”I think that’s a big deal. We’ve been in a lot of situations where we haven’t gotten it done in the fourth quarter but we have recently, so that’s good.”

With the Raptors keying on him in the final period, Henderson played the role of distributor and the Bobcats leaned heavily on Mullens and Ben Gordon down the stretch.

— Reported by Steve Reed of the Associated Press

Heat barely survive Cavs, get 24th win in a row

Miami’s winning streak was in danger of disappearing – in Cleveland, of all places.

But LeBron James wouldn’t give up.

”That guy right there doesn’t want to lose in this building,” teammate Dwayne Wade said, nodding toward James, who left many angry Cavaliers fans behind when he bolted for Miami as a free agent three years ago. ”Not tonight.”

James scored 25 points as the Heat overcame a 27-point deficit in the third quarter and won their 24th straight game, 98-95 over the short-handed Cleveland Cavaliers on Wednesday night to extend the second-longest winning streak in NBA history.

The Heat are within nine games of matching the record of 33 consecutive wins held by the 1971-72 Los Angeles Lakers. Once believed to be untouchable, the mark is now within reach.

James and his teammates have insisted the record isn’t one of their goals, and for more than 30 minutes the defending champions seemed disinterested and on the verge of losing for the first time since Feb. 1. Miami trailed 67-40 with 7:44 left in the third quarter.

— Reported by Tom Withers of the Associated Press

Unclear when Danny Granger will be healthy for Pacers

The $13-million question surrounding the Indiana Pacers and Danny Granger is: when will he overcome his patellar tendinosis and get back on the court to help the team?

There’s no definite answer for that, according to Dr. Christopher Kaeding, orthopedic surgeon at Ohio State University Sports Medicine.

Granger has been sidelined for all but five games this season because of the injury to his left knee. The Pacers will not comment on the injury due to HIPPA laws. Granger has declined interview requests since the team announced he was going to be shutdown again March 6.

Patellar tendinosis, often referred to as “jumper’s knee,” is when the tendon is overloaded and becomes inflamed.

— Reported by Mike Wells of the Indianapolis Star

Derrick Rose return date for Bulls still remains uncertain

Chicago Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau Wednesday said he doesn’t believe even Derrick Rose knows when the former MVP will return to the court following knee surgery.

“I think (Rose is) being very truthful in what he said,” Thibodeau said. “I don’t think he knows (if he’ll return this year). The way he’s approached (rehab) and this is from the moment he had the surgery, the next day, he puts everything he has into whatever he’s being asked to do. He says he’ll know when it’s time. And we have to trust him. And as I said before, I trust him implicitly.

“He’ll tell all of us (when he’s ready). Trust me, he understands what’s going on here. We just have to work through it.”

Rose said March 12 that he can do everything in practice but he still needs to get his confidence back, and he didn’t rule out sitting the entire season.

— Reported by Nick Friedell of ESPN Chicago

Coach Thibodeau would like expansion of NBA in-game video replays

After a controversial loss to the Denver Nuggets on Monday, Chicago Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau said he would like to see video replay expanded so referees could review more calls late in games.

Thibodeau angrily barked at referees late in Monday’s game after a Kosta Koufos tip-in in the final minute wasn’t reviewed but a Joakim Noah tip-in with 1.7 seconds left in overtime was checked. The explanation given to Thibodeau at the time was that the Koufos play couldn’t be reviewed because it was not called at the time on the floor. The Noah play was called, according to the officials — despite Thibodeau’s appeal — and the ruling was upheld.

Thibodeau would like to see the technology used more in the future.

— Reported by Nick Friedell of ESPN Chicago

Former NFL player suing Mavericks great Rolando Blackman

A former NFL player and Dallas Cowboy has filed a lawsuit in a Dallas County court against former Dallas Maverick and All-Star Rolando Blackman, who he says convinced the cornerback to invest in a faulty African gold venture.

The former NFL player, Nathaniel Jones, met Blackman and fellow defendant David Mureeba, chief executive of a tech company, through “friends and contacts,” according to the lawsuit filed this week.

Last spring, the two defendants in the suit presented Jones with an opportunity to invest in exploration and refinement of gold through another of Mureeba’s businesses, East Africa Power & Energy. They told him his investment of $150,000 would be used to airlift precious metals from East Africa to Belgium, where the gold would be sold to a refinery, according to the lawsuit.

Mureeba and Blackman guaranteed Jones a 4 percent return on his investment. Mureeba encouraged the former football player to invest more.

— Reported by Christina Rosales of the Dallas Morning News

Should Pistons arena be in downtown Detroit?

Auburn Hills City Manager Pete Auger balked at the idea that the Palace of Auburn Hills or the Detroit Pistons’ home floor should be in downtown Detroit — an idea that has been repeated by one major downtown Detroit investor.

“It doesn’t make any business sense to do that,” Auger said. “We have a private business entity that’s paying taxes up here.”

The Palace and the Detroit Pistons are majority owned by Tom Gores, the billionaire founder of Platinum Equity.

Gores appears to have no intentions of relocating the Pistons’ arena, but one of his NBA team owner peers has mentioned the idea on at least two different occasions.

— Reported by David Muller of Michigan Live

John Wall playing great March basketball

In the final month of his rookie season in 2011, John Wall averaged 19.4 points, 6.0 assists and 5.9 rebounds while shooting 45.4 percent from the field. In the second full month of last season’s lockout-shortened campaign, Wall averaged 19.2 points, 8.6 assists and 4.6 rebounds and shot 48 percent from the field.

If he maintains his current pace for the next seven games, Wall would turn March into the best statistical month of his professional career.

In 10 games this month, Wall is averaging 20.1 points, 7.7 assists and 4.5 rebounds while shooting 52.4 percent. Wall has failed to record at least six assists in only two games, with three games of 10 or more helpers. He has scored in double figures in each game and tallied at least 23 points in four of his past five games.

“I just give credit to my teammates because they make things easier for me, being able to find spots and knock down shots and get me easy opportunities to score,” Wall said. “My teammates are getting open, [I’m] finding them and I was able to get free throws and layups.”

— Reported by Michael Lee of the Washington Post (Blog)

Obama picks Indiana to win NCAA basketball championship

President Barack Obama on Wednesday picked Indiana University to win the NCAA annual men’s college basketball tournament, joining in the “March Madness” office pool craze that sweeps America every spring.

The president, an avid sports fan, forecast that Indiana would defeat the widely favored University of Louisville in the championship game.

“I think this is Indiana’s year,” he said in an interview on ESPN, the sports cable network.

Obama, who began a three day trip to the Middle East on Wednesday, taped the interview on Tuesday.

— Reported by Mark Felsenthal of Reuters