Houston Rockets General Manager Daryl Morey announced today that the team has recalled forward/center Donatas Motiejunas from Houston’s single-affiliation NBA D-League partner Rio Grande Valley.
Motiejunas (7-0, 222, Lithuania), who was assigned to Rio Grande Valley on Nov. 13, averaged 24.0 points and 9.5 rebounds in two starts with the Vipers. In Friday’s season opener against Bakersfield, Motiejunas led the team with 31 points and eight boards in 36 minutes. Last night, he posted a double-double with 17 points and 11 rebounds against the Jam.
Grizzlies forward Darrell Arthur is expected to make his regular-season debut Friday night but insists he was ready the first time he participated in practice.
Doctors and the head athletic trainer cleared Arthur for contact workouts last week. He stepped onto the court and soon caught a lob pass from teammate Josh Selby. When Arthur threw down the alley-oop dunk, he removed any doubts about his recovery.
“A lot of guys were telling me to take my time and don’t rush,” Arthur said. “But I went and caught a lob from Josh Selby and everybody was like (darn!). That’s the type of player I am. I’m going to make those athletic plays. That’s how I knew I was ready.”
The NBA admitted on Thursday to missing a foul on the decisive play of Toronto’s loss to the Bobcats a day earlier.
“On the final possession of Charlotte’s 98-97 win over Toronto on Nov. 21, the game officials missed a foul by Charlotte’s Michael Kidd-Gilchrist against Toronto’s Andrea Bargnani on a jump shot. Bargnani should have been given two free throws and the clock stopped with approximately 2.4 seconds remaining in the game,” read the missive at NBA.com.
Credit the league for admitting the error, but it won’t do much for the Raptors.
The ninth loss of the season (against three victories) stays on the books and the disappointment remains.
The Los Angeles Lakers had talked about bringing Showtime back to the franchise when they hired Mike D’Antoni to implement his fast and flashy offense.
The curtains are still waiting to be raised on that act.
Kobe Bryant scored an efficient 38 points but Dwight Howard and Pau Gasol struggled inside, and the lethargic Lakers lost 113-97 to the struggling Sacramento Kings on Wednesday night to snap a three-game winning streak.
”If we’re going to play Showtime, my God, they just closed the whole theatre on us,” D’Antoni said. ”Showtime, are you kidding? It was Muppet Time.”
Marcus Thornton scored 23 points and Tyreke Evans had 18 to pace Kings, who had lost five straight games. Jason Thompson added 13 points and 10 rebounds to help Sacramento run away in the fourth quarter and cement the latest Lakers setback…
Bryant finished 11-of-20 shooting and Jodie Meeks had 15 points off the bench as D’Antoni lost for the first time on the Lakers bench. A night after beating Brooklyn in Los Angeles, the Lakers might’ve been bad enough to give D’Antoni a headache to go with the pain still throbbing in his surgically replaced knee.
— Reported by Antonio Gonzalez of the Associated Press
Evans, who was one of the main subjects of the NBA’s preseason instructional video about the new flopping rules, has become the first player to be fined for flopping under the new anti-flopping policy.
The Nets’ backup power forward was fined $5,000 after he committed his second flop of the season in the third quarter of Tuesday night’s 95-90 loss to the Lakers in Los Angeles, when he clearly exaggerated contact from Lakers forward Metta World Peace.
“It’s a tough spot for us, because Reggie sets physical screens, he rebounds, and I don’t necessarily consider him a flopper,” Nets coach Avery Johnson said before last night’s game here against the Warriors. “I don’t see him flopping in practice, he just plays hard and goes all out. It’s just a tough one. Hopefully he won’t be a marked man, even if there is a physical confrontation out there on the floor, that they won’t consider it flopping.”
The San Antonio Spurs today announced that they have recalled guard Cory Joseph from the Austin Toros of the NBA Development League.
Joseph has seen action in one game for the Spurs this season prior to his assignment to Austin on Nov. 15. For his career, the University of Texas product has appeared in 30 games for the Silver and Black, averaging 1.9 points and 1.1 assists in 8.9 minutes.
Joseph will be available tonight when San Antonio plays at Boston at 6:30 p.m.
The San Antonio Spurs today announced that they have signed James Anderson of the NBA D-League’s Rio Grande Valley Vipers. Anderson is the second NBA D-League call-up of the season.
Anderson participated in training camp with the Atlanta Hawks this past October before signing with the D-League. He appeared in six preseason games in Atlanta and averaged 2.0 points in 10.7 minutes.
The 6-6 guard was drafted by the Spurs with the 20th overall pick in the first round of the 2010 NBA Draft out of Oklahoma State University. In 77 career games in San Antonio from 2010-12, Anderson averaged 3.7 points and 1.3 rebounds in 11.5 minutes.
Anderson will be available Wednesday night, Nov. 21, when San Antonio plays at Boston at 6:30 p.m.
The Indiana Pacers announced Wednesday that rookies Miles Plumlee and Orlando Johnson will join the Fort Wayne Mad Ants for two games this weekend. This is the first time the Pacers have assigned players to their NBA D-League affiliate.
Plumlee, a 6-10, 245-pound center/forward who was the Pacers’ first-round pick last June (26th overall), has played in four games this season, scoring four points and pulling down five rebounds. Johnson, a 6-5 guard who was a second-round pick that the Pacers acquired from Sacramento on draft night, has played in two games, but hasn’t scored.
“We could not be happier to have Miles and Orlando join our team for these first two games,” said Mad Ants head coach Duane Ticknor. “We think we can provide both players a great opportunity to improve their games, and I am excited for this watershed moment in our partnership with the Pacers.”
Fort Wayne hosts Erie Friday night and Maine Sunday. The two players will re-join the Pacers for their three-game western road trip next week.
Grinnell’s Jack Taylor didn’t just amend the NCAA’s record books when he scored 138 points — a new collegiate high mark — in his team’s 179-104 victory over Faith Baptist Bible Tuesday night. The Division III star wrote a new chapter.
“There was a point during the second half where I hit a number of threes in a row — maybe seven or eight — I felt like anything I threw up was going in,” Taylor said. “I’ve been in the zone before but I’ve never taken so many shots.”
Bevo Francis of Rio Grande held the NCAA scoring record with 113 points against Hillsdale in 1954. In 1953, Francis had 116 against Ashland Junior College. Frank Selvy is the only other player to reach triple figures, scoring 100 points for Division I Furman against Newberry in 1954…
By the end of the night, Taylor was 52-for-108 (27-for-71 from the 3-point line) and he’d established a new collegiate record.
Under coach David Arseneault, the Pioneers press and shoot 3s like nobody else in the country in any level. They’ve led the nation in scoring for 17 of the past 19 seasons while ranking first nationally in 3-point shooting for the 15 of those past 19 years. But none of them have had a night quite like Taylor — who never saw this coming.
Taylor recently transferred to Grinnell, located about 50 miles east of Des Moines, after playing one season for Wisconsin-La Crosse. He struggled in his debut at the nearby Wartburg Tournament over the weekend by hitting only 11 of 41 shots — including only 6 of 34 3-point attempts Still, he averaged 23.5 points a game.
But Taylor started Tuesday’s night game off slow — at least according to his standards. His coaches figured the best way to get him on track was for him to keep chucking, so that’s what Taylor did.
