Terriers

MIAMI (AP) &mdash; Miami and New York are&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/jimmy-butler-heat-nba-playoffs-f2f75023171cd047bb8cae29d791c9c1">wondering who will be able to play.</a>&nbsp;Golden State and the Los Angeles Lakers are wondering which team will land the next punch.
A pair of Game 3s await as the NBA&rsquo;s conference semifinals continue Saturday &mdash; the fifth-seeded Knicks visit the eighth-seeded Heat in the East, while the sixth-seeded Warriors visit the seventh-seeded Lakers in the West. Both series are tied 1-1.
Both have followed the same script: The road teams won Game 1, those victories going&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/heat-knicks-butler-nba-playoffs-2023-f4474b8a32678b93fef1c3c90da8d449">to Miami</a>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/lakers-warriors-lebron-curry-davis-playoffs-69d7ad92747c3a86640d06dbbf5fe517">the Lakers,</a>&nbsp;while the home teams won Game 2 to even the series. The&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/knicks-heat-brunson-butler-randle-playoffs-25c2da5fef30890bfae60fcd309ed7b7">Knicks squeaked theirs out 111-105;</a>&nbsp;the&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/lakers-warriors-playoffs-591ee82b1104266a28d7d47a9914ae16">Warriors rolled 127-100.</a>
&ldquo;We&rsquo;ll be better,&rdquo; Lakers big man Anthony Davis said. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll be better.&rdquo;
In Miami, all eyes are on Jimmy Butler and his sprained right ankle. It kept him out of Game 2 on Tuesday, and there is some optimism he can play Saturday. Butler took to social media to show that he was putting himself through a shooting workout Thursday night.
&ldquo;Our guys love to compete, any place, anywhere, against any team,&rdquo; Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said. &ldquo;We have the three days off in between. It definitely helps, or at least in theory helps us gear up. But if we could have played this game (Thursday), our guys would have loved that as well.&rdquo;
The Knicks have enjoyed road success all season. Including playoffs, they&rsquo;re 26-18 away from Madison Square Garden this season &mdash; only Philadelphia (28-17), Boston (27-17) and Milwaukee (26-17) have been better. Sacramento was also 26-18 away from home.
It&rsquo;s New York&rsquo;s best road record since 1996-97, the fourth-best road mark in franchise history and a huge jump from their .306 road winning percentage over the last eight seasons before this one.
&ldquo;When you go on the road, there&rsquo;s less distractions,&rdquo; Knicks guard Josh Hart said. &ldquo;You&rsquo;re not worried about family, tickets, where you&rsquo;re going to eat after the game, you have nothing, only basketball.&rdquo;
Golden State has struggled on the road all season; the Warriors&rsquo; 13-32 record away from home is better than that of only three teams&rsquo; &mdash; Detroit, Houston and San Antonio, the franchises that finished at the bottom of the NBA and have the best chance at winning the lottery and&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/wembanyama-nba-draft-spurs-ee1a9bd2232173666d3302bb491c7c5c">right to draft French phenom Victor Wembanyama.</a>
But the Warriors won two road playoff games against the Kings in Round 1 and now will try to win another in Los Angeles.
&ldquo;It&rsquo;s going to be a whole lot tougher, Game 3 in LA,&rdquo; Warriors guard Stephen Curry said after Game 2. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a big morale boost to give ourselves life and belief that our game can carry on the road. So, I&rsquo;m excited about the opportunity and the challenge ahead.&rdquo;
This will be the fifth time the Lakers go into Game 3 of a series tied at 1-1 since LeBron James went to Los Angeles.
In those previous Game 3s, they&rsquo;re 4-0.
&ldquo;Give credit where credit&rsquo;s due. They played exceptionally well and we didn&rsquo;t,&rdquo; James said after Game 2. &ldquo;The series is tied 1-1, so that&rsquo;s where we&rsquo;re at.&rdquo;
KNICKS AT HEAT
Series tied 1-1. Game 3, 3:30 p.m. EDT, Saturday, ABC
&mdash; NEED TO KNOW: A three-day break with no games is likely what the doctors (and athletic trainers, massage therapists and everyone else involved in player health for both teams) ordered. Miami got Game 1, New York got Game 2 and the crowd in Miami tends to not be overwhelmingly pro-Heat when the Knicks are in town. There are many transplants from New York in South Florida, and they&rsquo;ll let their presence be known Saturday.
&mdash; KEEP AN EYE ON: Bam Adebayo. Miami&rsquo;s center blamed himself for the Game 2 loss, has struggled from the field by shooting only 43% over his last five games and knows that the Heat need more. If he gets going early, everything else tends to open up for Miami&rsquo;s shooters and slashers.
&mdash; INJURY WATCH:&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/oladipo-injury-heat-nba-playoffs-d5d7cec8f9a875de139be68e9bb3a538">Victor Oladipo&rsquo;s season is over</a>&nbsp;and Tyler Herro is still weeks away from any hope of a return for Miami, which is waiting to see if Butler (ankle) can play and Max Strus has any ill effects from his bruised back in Game 2. For the Knicks, Jalen Brunson was playing on a bad ankle in Game 2, and Julius Randle came back from an ankle sprain.
&mdash; PRESSURE IS ON: Miami. The Heat did what they were supposed to do at MSG, getting a split and taking home-court advantage. If they let it go in Game 3, it&rsquo;ll be quite an emotional boost for the Knicks.
WARRIORS AT LAKERS
Series tied 1-1. Game 3, 8:30 p.m. EDT, Saturday, ABC
&mdash; NEED TO KNOW: The Warriors have won at least one road game in each of their last 28 playoff series, the longest streak in NBA history. They know they&rsquo;ve got to win at least one in Los Angeles during this series to keep alive their hopes of a fifth title in nine years.
&mdash; KEEP AN EYE ON: The foul line, especially the one that the Lakers happen to be shooting from in each half. Game 2 was the 225th time in their four seasons together that the Lakers got more than 37:00 of action from James and/or Davis, and the first such game where they combined to shoot no more than one free throw. They shot one in a combined 61:02 of Game 2.
&mdash; INJURY WATCH: Golden State&rsquo;s Kevon Looney was dealing with an illness in Game 2, but other than all the aches and pains that accompany basketball this late in a season, the Warriors and Lakers both seem OK on the health front.
&mdash; PRESSURE IS ON: The Lakers. Golden State outscored LA 84-47 in the middle two quarters of Game 2. The defending champs are still powderkeg-level explosive, and if they get a second straight win in this series, they&rsquo;ll become even more dangerous.

A pair of Game 3s await as the NBA’s conference semifinals continue Saturday, with Heat-Knicks and Lakers-Warriors both tied at 1-1.

Heat, Lakers head home, seek 2-1 leads over Knicks, Warriors

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Falling under the category of "too little too late," the NBA announced today its first COVID-19-induced postponements of the season.&nbsp;
The Chicago Bulls will see their next two games &mdash; against the Detroit Pistons and Toronto Raptors &mdash; postponed, and as of this writing, they have 10 players in the league's health-and-safety protocols. But this had been building up for a few days now, and Chicago even played a game as recently as Saturday.&nbsp;
The Charlotte Hornets have seen five players enter the health-and-safety protocols, and the number of teams affected is ballooning once again. The news should read as a very glaring reminder for anyone who is living in their own reality: We still live in a pandemic and are well into the worst season for sickness. The NBA teams and the league itself should remember that safety is far more important than scheduling integrity and revenue.
Though the Bulls will make this week's Sour Rankings, it's less due to on-court struggles and more due to a general frustration about these postponments and how the league and team have handled the past week.
If you're new to the Sour Rankings, here's a refresher: Unlike the typical "power rankings" that repeat themselves throughout sports media, Sour Rankings are a bizarro-world counter. These rankings highlight the top-10 most frustrating NBA franchises throughout the season, and they will be updated every week to match the twists and turns of the league.&nbsp;
This is not merely a bottom-10 of your typical best-to-worst power rankings. You will see championship contenders and playoff hopefuls mixed in with struggling squads. Teams well under .500 may never touch the Sour Rankings because they are on track with their respective processes. Injuries, drama, transactions and generally underwhelming play will earn you a spot on this list.
The central question is ultimately this: How good should you feel about the direction of each franchise? Let's get going:
Escaping the Sour Rankings:&nbsp;The Dallas Mavericks went 2-2 this week, but with Luka Doncic and Kristaps Porzingis both back and healthy, they provide optimism that the franchise can ascend the Western Conference ladder. The Miami Heat made a quick stop in the rankings, but they leaped back out after beating the Bucks and shorthanded Bulls.
10. Chicago Bulls (17-10)
The Bulls have lost two games in a row in large part due to their decimated roster. In their most recent 26-point defeat at the hands of the Heat, Troy Brown Jr. made his first start of the season; he's averaging 12.8 minutes per game. The bench consisted of Alfonzo McKinnie, Devon Dotson and Tony Bradley, with Marko Simonovic, Tyler Cook and Alize Johnson playing garbage-time minutes. There really isn't much more to uncover; this situation simply sucks for the Bulls, and it's going to affect a close playoff race.
(Last week: Unranked)
9. Oklahoma City Thunder (8-18)
After a 2-2 week, the Thunder lift up a tad in the rankings. The bar is low for the franchise after all; we just need to see meaningful performances from prospects. This week, it was Tre Mann who capitalized on a few solid games. The No. 18 pick averaged 8.3 points per game off the bench and knocked down 46.2% of his threes in the tiny sample. Mann projects as a pure scoring guard, so his on-court value will really come from weeks like this.
(Last week: 7)
8. Minnesota Timberwolves (12-15)
Minnesota finally stopped a five-game losing streak with a sorely-needed win against the Portland Trail Blazers &mdash; not exactly a statement victory.
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A very frustrated Karl-Anthony Towns: &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve lost for a long time here and I&rsquo;m not trying to fucking lose anymore. It&rsquo;s pretty simple as that. Food don&rsquo;t taste good, life don&rsquo;t feel the same.&rdquo; <a href="https://t.co/mMFl36Y2Nt">pic.twitter.com/mMFl36Y2Nt</a>
&mdash; John Meyer (@meyerNBA) <a href="https://twitter.com/meyerNBA/status/1469518068447645697?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 11, 2021</a></blockquote>

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The slide culminated with the above fiery press conference from Karl-Anthony Towns, which is the last thing you want to see from the franchise centerpiece. Minnesota has the 26th-ranked offense in the NBA over the past two weeks, which is a major concern given KAT's dominance and the team's on-paper talent.
(Last week: Unranked)
7. Sacramento Kings (11-16)
In 10 games under interim head coach Alvin Gentry, the Kings are 5-5. They have the 13th-ranked offense and 26th-ranked defense, per Cleaning the Glass. This week the team went 1-2, dropping 142 points on the Orlando Magic before losing a close contest to Charlotte and a not-so-close one to Cleveland.
So far, it doesn't really feel like much has changed from a team success standpoint, though perhaps that's unfair to expect in just 10 games. Still, it means Sacramento is losing ground in the playoff race.
(Last week: 8)
6. Detroit Pistons (4-22)
Fall-O for Paolo? All Set for Chet? Party for Jabari? I don't really know if there's a good catchphrase for this year's tank war, but the Pistons are most certainly winning it. The problem is that along the way, the supporting prospects around Cade Cunningham have not shown any consistent growth. Would Pistons fans consider anyone else a true building block? Maybe you can convince me on Isaiah Stewart or Saddiq Bey, but I'm not sure right now.
With J<a href="https://www.basketballnews.com/stories/lakers-blazers-among-dozens-of-teams-interested-in-jerami-grant" target="_blank" rel="noopener">erami Grant engrossed in trade rumors</a>, his market suddenly becomes the second-largest storyline behind Cunningham's development.
(Last week: 9)
5. Denver Nuggets (13-13)
The Nuggets went 2-2 this week via a loss to the Bulls, a win over New Orleans and a split with the Spurs. With Jokic back, they've stabilized a bit (not exactly a surprise) and can begin their climb out of the Sour Rankings. The MVP and best-player-on-Earth contender averaged a whopping 28.3 points, 13.3 rebounds and 11.0 assists per game this past week.
(Last week: 4)
4. Los Angeles Lakers (15-13)
The Lakers only inch up one spot because despite a 3-1 week, their stretch may have been highlighted by Charles Barkley going off on Anthony Davis' recent performance. L.A. has not been consistent as a team and didn't beat any opponent with a winning record. But I do want to give the floor to LeBron James.
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LeBron James over the last 8 Games: 39 PTS, 6 AST, 5 REB 30 PTS, 11 AST, 7 REB 33 PTS, 9 AST, 5 REB 23 PTS, 6 AST, 11 REB 30 PTS, 5 AST, 4 REB 20 PTS, 11 AST, 10 REB 33 PTS, 6 AST, 5 REB 30 PTS, 10 AST, 11 REB <a href="https://t.co/9CF6YEQbyh">pic.twitter.com/9CF6YEQbyh</a>
&mdash; Hoop Central (@TheHoopCentral) <a href="https://twitter.com/TheHoopCentral/status/1470255961583472642?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 13, 2021</a></blockquote>

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Even though you've probably already seen these stats, it's worth noting that he averaged 28.3 points, 8.0 assists and 7.5 rebounds in four games while canning 41.7% of his three-pointers. He's winning games in Cavs-esque fashion and defying the laws of aging once again.
(Last week: 3)
3. Indiana Pacers (12-16)
Our No. 1 squad from last week promptly won its next three games to confuse the heck out of everybody. That doesn't mean things have improved a ton, as <a href="https://theathletic.com/3005965/2021/12/09/as-pacers-consider-shake-up-myles-turner-seeks-bigger-role-with-more-opportunity/?article_source=search&amp;search_query=myles%20turner" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Myles Turner told&nbsp;The Athletic&nbsp;that he doesn't want to stay with the Pacers in his current role</a>. That's bound to force trade conversations, and maybe it's for the best, but things could get pretty awkward over the next two months.
(Last week: 1)
2. New York Knicks (12-15)
New York has the second-worst defense of any NBA team over the past two weeks. The franchise is 1-6 in its last seven games and just lost RJ Barrett and Obi Toppin to COVID-19 protocols. Quentin Grimes' 27-point outburst on Sunday is propping up all positive morale around a squad that does not look remotely close to playoff contention.
Meanwhile, the Knicks have been six points per 100 possessions worse when marquee free-agent signing Evan Fournier takes the court.
(Last week: 2)
1. Portland Trail Blazers (11-16)
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"alright we ran a pindown and it didn't work let me just pull from deep we're good" what is this what is this thinking how. <a href="https://t.co/TULKe1CIlQ">pic.twitter.com/TULKe1CIlQ</a>
&mdash; Steve Jones Jr. (@stevejones20) <a href="https://twitter.com/stevejones20/status/1470225790310789120?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 13, 2021</a></blockquote>

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Last week was an absolute mess for the Trail Blazers, from the <a href="https://www.basketballnews.com/stories/damian-lillard-wants-2year-extension-which-could-shape-blazers-gm-search" target="_blank" rel="noopener">complicated reports about Damian Lillard</a> to the current five-game losing streak. Portland is 1-8 in its last nine games and completely rudderless. Lillard made his return on Sunday, but it wasn't pretty despite the box-score totals.
The Blazers boast the 27th-ranked offense and 22nd-ranked defense over the past few weeks with some daunting games coming up on the schedule.
(Last week: 5)

The Bulls have been hit hard by player absences due to COVID-19, and now the NBA has postponed two games.

NBA Sour Rankings: The pandemic strikes back

With Kyrie Irving, Kevin Durant and James Harden, the Brooklyn Nets and their embarrassment of riches may one day rule not only New York City, but the NBA.
That day, however, is not today. And believe it or not, the NBA is better for it.
For as long as we can remember &mdash; whether it was the Los Angeles Lakers, Boston Celtics, Chicago Bulls or Golden State Warriors &mdash; the NBA has been ruled by a super-team. Generally good for business, the super-teams were viewed as villains by many, but everyone watched with glazed-over eyes.
We wanted to see how long a dynastic team&rsquo;s reign could last.
Indeed, for the NBA, the existence of the super-team is nothing new, only the way they&rsquo;ve been constructed.
From the time LeBron James got ESPN to follow St. Vincent-St. Mary &mdash; from the time he was driving around in a 2003 Hummer H2 &mdash; he understood his power. In 2010, he used it to his advantage.
On July 8 of that year, the young king summoned everyone he could to Connecticut to reveal that he was opting for a secondment in Florida. He rocked the boat, and since then, the NBA&rsquo;s owners have been struggling to not capsize.
James willfully sacrificed money, opted for short-term contracts and did all he could to apply pressure to the front offices for which he worked. In 2010, he flexed his muscles, grabbed his future and used his mighty size 15 Nikes to kick down the door that fellow stars such as Carmelo Anthony, Dwight Howard and Anthony Davis would later use to make daring escapes.
About 11 years later, James Harden would follow.
Contract be damned, after eight years in Houston, Harden saw the world around him change yet again and decided he no longer wanted to continue the good fight without Daryl Morey and Mike D&rsquo;Antoni. Yet another sidekick in Russell Westbrook came and went, so Harden decided he would, too.
All things considered, it&rsquo;s easy to understand why Harden would want out.
It&rsquo;s also easy to understand why, given the circumstances behind his exit, the Basketball Gods couldn&rsquo;t in good conscience reward the Nets with a championship. Not in Year 1, anyway.
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When Sean Marks took residence in Brooklyn in 2016, the franchise was coming off of a 21-win campaign. Future draft picks were still owed to the Boston Celtics for the Kevin Garnett-Paul Pierce trade and the Nets were deemed to have no future.
Marks changed that almost immediately.
He turned over every stone, using some to lay a foundation and others to build walls. D&rsquo;Angelo Russell, Caris LeVert, Jarrett Allen, Spencer Dinwiddie, Joe Harris, Rodions Kurucs &mdash; Marks found players, harnessed their talents and eventually watched Kenny Atkinson push his misfits to 42 wins. It took three seasons for the Nets to go from a laughingstock to the team that Irving and Durant wanted.
What was always sad about the acquisitions of Irving and Durant, though, was the fact that sacrifices had to be made.
Russell &mdash; a player who had come into his own in Brooklyn, growing and maturing into a franchise player &mdash; had to be let go to clear cap space. Wanting to do right by him, the Nets were just as motivated as the Warriors and Russell were to get a double sign-and-trade done for Durant, and that was that.
Irving is a superstar and a champion. He's an obvious upgrade over Russell, but the lefty grew in Brooklyn, and seeing him jettisoned hurt.
And that was just the beginning.
Irving didn&rsquo;t necessarily endear himself to his teammates in his first year in Brooklyn, and after an 11-point loss to the Philadelphia 76ers, he famously opined that the players that comprised the team&rsquo;s roster simply <a href="https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/28493556/kyrie-irving-says-team-needs-glaring-nets-fall-76ers" target="_blank" rel="noopener">weren&rsquo;t good enough</a> to win. Not even two months later, Coach Atkinson was fired. And in the not-too-distant future, for Harden, the Nets sacrificed most of the remaining players who built the culture that seemed to attract Irving and Durant in the first place.
Seeing Caris LeVert and Jarrett Allen traded to bring in Harden, again, made sense from a basketball-talent standpoint. But there&rsquo;s no denying that along with Coach Atkinson, Russell, LeVert and Allen were the three players who the gave the team&rsquo;s fans the most pride. They were Brooklyn&rsquo;s own.
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In no time at all, it seemed, the Nets went from a young core with pure intentions to one ruled by three superstars, each with their own baggage, each motivated to win a championship not for the franchise or the city, but for their individual legacies. The Nets happened to be a convenient place to accomplish their individuals goals.
And when Brooklyn was presented with a proposition from a supermodel, it dumped its high school sweetheart that stuck with it through thick and thin.
All the while, Giannis Antetokounmpo, secretly, was shopping for engagement rings.
With admirable humility, those who know Giannis well and have watched him grow will tell you that deep down inside, he believes he owes Milwaukee for giving him a shot. He could&rsquo;ve opted to chase a championship anywhere &mdash; Los Angeles, San Francisco, Miami &mdash; but he seemingly learned from Durant&rsquo;s experience. No matter where he went, a championship wouldn&rsquo;t have felt the same if he was wearing a different jersey and celebrating with a new fan base.
Along the way, Antetokounmpo came to realize that he was a part of something &mdash; a team, an organization, a fraternity&hellip; A community. So with no promise and no guarantee, he doubled-down on his commitment and decided that he would dedicate himself to not only winning a championship, but winning one in Milwaukee.
So when his Bucks trailed by two points in Game 7, after they&rsquo;d gone the first four minutes of overtime without a basket, Giannis received a pass in the pinch-post and felt Durant on his hip. The Greek Freak had longed for an opportunity for redemption, and it came in the form of a soft sky hook that slowly fell through the net after meekly bouncing on the rim three times.
&ldquo;It was definitely exhausting, but it was worth it,&rdquo; Giannis said after Khris Middleton&rsquo;s game-winner helped the Bucks walk out of Barclays Center with their heads held high.
&ldquo;It&rsquo;s gonna hurt a little bit if you want to be great,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;And I know that.&rdquo;
Now the Nets do, too.
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Brooklyn will be back. One year from now, they&rsquo;ll be wiser, they&rsquo;ll have better chemistry and, we can assume, they&rsquo;ll be healthier. They'll also be an attractive destination for ring-chasing veterans. Collectively, they&rsquo;ll now have this painful experience to fuel them, and they&rsquo;ll be better for it.
And that&rsquo;s the way it&rsquo;s supposed to be.
Whether you believe in the Basketball Gods or not, winning a championship shouldn&rsquo;t be something that players can just show up and be able to do. It should require trials and tribulations. It should require painful growth and adversity. It should require sweat, sacrifice and tears.
As a unit, the Bucks have paid those dues, as have scores of other teams. The Nets got caught trying to jump the line.
For the league&rsquo;s teams that are not in sexy markets &mdash; the Portlands, the Denvers and, yes, the Milwaukees &mdash; forming a perceived super-team is largely unrealistic. Outside of places like Los Angeles, Boston, Miami and New York, it&rsquo;s difficult to imagine a team assembling a roster with as much star power as Brooklyn did this past season.
With its core playing just eight games together and its head coach having zero experience, seeing the Nets win this season would&rsquo;ve hurt the morale of the dreamers. Seeing them fall short in their first year together, as harsh as it may sound, will be viewed as a just outcome for the 29 other teams. That&rsquo;s true, regardless of whether they admit it.
In the end, competition is what professional sports are all about. No matter how mighty Goliath appears to be, David has to pick up his slingshot.
The Bucks, in defeating the undermanned Nets, have provided Damian Lillard, Donovan Mitchell and their ilk with some hope. Under the right set of circumstances, it&rsquo;s still possible to slew a giant.
Perhaps the Bucks only delayed the inevitable. It&rsquo;s hard to imagine Irving, Durant and Harden not finding a way to succeed together in Brooklyn.
But before a team has earned the right to be called champions, they're supposed to traverse a road that's littered with the bones of dashed hopes and painful heartbreak. The journey that a team takes together is just as meaningful and important as the final stop atop the podium in June.
Had the Nets managed to put it all together this season, especially had they defeated the Bucks and the Phoenix Suns along the way, we may have forgotten that. We may have lost sight of what truly makes success at the highest level glorifying.
Thankfully, the Basketball Gods made sure we were reminded.

While the Brooklyn Nets hope for better luck next year, the NBA's small-market teams are probably breathing a sigh of relief.

The Brooklyn Nets fell short, and the NBA is better off because of it

Ethan Fuller evaluates the NBA landscape at the quarter mark of the season.