An (Anti-)Climactic night

Anwar, Lebron, & the Cav’s were eliminated in a night of intrigue

I was pleasantly surprised to find several intriguing subplots still left on the last night of the regular season. Here are the highlights from the night:

Cleveland 104, Toronto 95
New Jersey 102, Boston 93
-The 8th seed in the Eastern Conference was still up for grabs heading up to the last day, with Cleveland needing a win and a New Jersey loss to Boston to capture the 8th seed. The games were being played simultaneously, with the Cavs game ending just a few minutes prior to the Nets game. To add to the intrigue the Cavalier’s opponent was the Raptors, who, with a victory could have pushed the Anti-Christ, Vince Carter , out of the playoffs.

In Toronto, James had a monster all around game, posting a triple-double (27-14-14), and leading his team to a 23 point lead by the end of the 3rd. At the same time, over in Boston, the Celtics took a 58-47 lead at halftime, only to have Jeff Van Gundy rip into the Nets at halftime and cause a furious 3rd quarter rally, outscoring the Celtics 32-8 in the 3rd quarter. The Nets were then able to withstand a 4th quarter rally by the Celtics to hold on for the win and clinch the 8th seed, and a 4-0 pummeling from the Heat in the first round. Stern not happy. Lebron go bye-bye to playoffs.

Indiana 85, Chicago 83
-Chery Miller caught the game from the stands.
-The Pacers, with the victory, were able to clinch the 6th seed. That’s HUGE. For those unaware, the 7th and 8th seeds in the east challenge the Pistons and Heat respectively in the first round, while the 6th seed sees a massive drop in competition by getting the Celtics.
-EVERYONE in the audience was wearing I love Reggie Miller t-shirts and holding up Reggie signs.
-Reggie was definitely aware of the cameras being on him. Completely playing to the crowd & cameras with forced, over-dramatized actions like long talks with journalists on the sideline, way too enthusiastically powdering his hands in his pre free-throw/game ritual... They even had this inane pregame huddle/celebration after announcing Reggie that was… I really couldn’t do it justice with a description. You know what? F**k it. 16 years in the league, spanning the times of Larry and Magic, Michael, Scottie, Charles, Hakeem, and now Garnett and Lebron. His career could be seen as a time capsule of the leagues growth and evolution. Take a bow Reggie, I salute you.
-In a similar fashion, in a nationally televised game in March versus the Lakers, in which he turned back the clock for 39 points, He did the exact same thing. Check out the 4th-quarter flow of this game:
http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/playbyplay?gameId=250318011&period=4
The Pacers were up by six with 27 seconds remaining. For some strange reason, the Lakers felt they were still in this thing and fouled Miller THREE times prior to the conclusion of the game, giving him six free throw opportunities. With 27 seconds remaining and his team up by six, Reggie did an extended version of his hand chalking at the announcer’s table ceremony, egging on the crowd ovation, prior to EACH free throw opportunity. If I recall the game ended at 1am Pacific Time. (BTW, it was a classic Miller time performance and I do not blame him for reveling in the moment.)

Deborah and Raymond
were involved in some kind of wacky domestic dispute . I believe Ray’s mom was somehow involved.

Sacramento 132, Pheonix 107
-Bobby Jackson, on the IR for practically the entire season, was activated for the last game, in a test to see how effective he could be for the Kings in the playoffs. The result?
A lively performance, going for 15-6-5 in 16 min. Bobby Jackson DEFINITELY looks like he will be a factor in the Kings-Sonics match up. With the combination of Bibby and Jackson at the point, I believe it’s time to consider having some loyal Sonics fan take one for the team, and kidnap Luke Ridnour for the entirety of the series, Celtic Pride style.
-Also, while they didn’t play, it was announced that both Brad Miller and Peja Stojakovic (wearing nifty matching tan sierra suits behind the bench,) would be activated for the playoffs. Brad Miller was shown in a highlight shooting around during the pre-game warm-ups. Come back now Radman, you are needed!

Anwar Robinson
-was eliminated . Damn you, Scott Savol!!

In cruel heartbreaking fashion,
the Bobcats beat the Pistons, 97-86. That, added with the fact that the NEW ORLEANS Hornets lost to the Clippers, left them in a tie for the worst record in the league at 18-64 instead of the outright title for the Bobcats had they lost.
Some quotes:
``It's just great to go home like this, with a win and on a good note,'' Okafor said. ``We didn't win a lot of games this year, but we played hard in all of them and it's great to get a reward in the last one.''
The Bobcats played with one eye on the out-of-town scoreboard because Charlotte holds Cleveland's first-round draft pick, a lottery pick because New Jersey beat Boston on Wednesday night to end the Cavs' playoff bid.
``This win, the fans, getting that lottery pick ... we deserved something good to happen to us,'' Charlotte coach Bernie Bickerstaff said.

Congratulations, Bernie. Congratulations.

Note to readers:
You are not going to want to miss tomorrow’s post on Supersonicsoul.com. We were able to get THE INSIDER SCOOP on the Western Conference Playoffs with a VERY special guest interview, EXCLUSIVE to this site. You were warned. Bookmark us now.

Halftime Heroes: A Study In Futility, & Catching up with The Creek

Any relationship to Dawson or Billy Bob, Jeff?

Thinking about the possible playoff match between the Sonics and the Rockets got me to thinking:

If Billy Bob could rally the Permian High Panthers with an inspired speech, if James Van Der Beek can do the same with the West Canaan Coyotes , does it then lead to the potential existence of a real, living, breathing coach having the innate ability to inspire his team?

The beat downs I’ve witnessed the Sonics take in the 3rd qtr vs. the Rockets this year led me to take a quick look at the possibility that Van Gundy was one of these mythical creatures.

Observation:
In the 3 games in 2005 in which the Sonics faced Houston, the Rockets came out into the 3rd quarter with inspired play in 2 of them.
3rd quarter Hou vs. Sea scoring:
Game 1: 15-17
Game 2: 22-6
Game 3: 34-26
Total 71-49=22
22/3 games = 7.1 pt differential per 3rd quarter

Hypothesis:
Jeff Van Gundy is a great coach. In particular, Van Gundy has the ability, not found in all coaches, to inspire teams/players to increased performance output through motivational speaking. In particular, for this experiment, this ability is inherent in the transformation the Houston Rockets 2005 team achieves during halftime, and witnessed in their brief performance surge in the 3rd quarter following.

Procedure:
Take the Houston 2005 season 3rd quarter ppg differential, and compare it to the ave. quarter diff of the Rockets other 3 quarters (data through 80 games):

Analysis:
Total ppg Scored: 7575-1891=5684/80 games/3 qtrs= 23.68
Total ppg Allowed: 7297-1806=5491/80 games/3 qtrs= 22.88
Differential: +0.80 pts/qtr

Total pp 3rd qtr Scored: 1891
Total pp 3rd qtr All: 1806
Differential 85/80games/qtr= +1.06 pts/qtr

Results:
The pt differential seen between the average of quarters 1,2, & 4 are +0.80 per qtr. The pt. Differential for the 3rd qtr is +1.06. The difference is +0.26, about a quarter of a point.

Conclusion:
Not a DAMN thing!! While there is a ¼ point differential that may suggest Van Gundy does have some ability to inspire during halftime, that difference in all likelihood is too marginal to make any credible statement, considering all the other variables not taken into account in the test. What we can conclude is that the 3 games witnessed by my eyes (which indicated a huge ability by Van Gundy) were much too small a sample to make any logical assumption. Lesson learned: I am an idiot. Price paid: 45min of my life.

Reason #15,284 unemployment doesn’t suck:
-Being able to catch the Dawson’s Creek episode where Dawson’s dad dies, and the following episode as well. In-f**king-credible! For the rest of you that missed it, (huge spoiler alert!) in episode unknown of season 3-5 of the series, the writers, in a vain attempt to resuscitate the show, killed of a main/supporting character (they had previously exhausted all love triangle/interest options.) I remember catching the premiere season of Dawson’s Creek in the dorms and finding a new guilty pleasure, that is until the wheels fell off (maybe the damn thing never had wheels to begin with.)

So anyways, how do you go about killing off the father of the main character? End of the show, Mr. Leary goes out to buy groceries, leaves store with ice cream cone, gets in jeep, and on the way home (while doing the gratuitous scene where you sing along to some song on the radio, which has thankfully left my brain) the ice cream drops from the cone, he bends down to pick it up, and... BAM!!!! Cue car crash noise, fade to black, roll credits. Needless to say, I was locked in for the next episode (the reruns on TBS are shown in back to back blocks.)

So the next episode: classic premise, death of a side character, grieving main character shots, reminiscing scenes (they chose this thing where each one of the characters had a shot/scene where they were talking/remembering a particular poignant moment they had with the Dad (surprisingly Mr. Leary was still available to do these scenes.) You would think that under this premise the actors could pull off a few tear inducing performances… let me tell you, if you’ve never seen quality acting before, watching this episode won’t change that status. It was a certifiable train wreck of performances. From Dawson’s mom (how do you NOT hit the grieving widow part out of the park?? It’s like a hanging slider just begging to be taken for a ride,) to Dawson’s Dad (fully understand why the writers killed him off,) to Dawson himself (will we ever see a Mox-ian performance from Van Der Beek again?) it was brutal, awkward TV throughout. Needless to say, I loved every minute.

Final Rating- Two wildly enthusiastic thumbs up!

On a sidenote, I’ve caught several other episodes from this unknown season, and it’s brilliantly bad throughout. Today, Joey ( Katie Holmes) was singing in a rock band. Dee-liteful .

There really aren't enough superlatives to adequately discuss this show. And I believe I’m done emasculating myself now.

Booth.52@gmail.com

Deathmatch: Sonics vs Kings

With the Seattle Supersonics set to take on the Sacramento Kings in the first round of the NBA Playoffs, it's time to place your (imaginary) bets: Take our brand new Supersonicsoul Poll and let us know your playoff prediction.