Basketball Daily

In there second meeting this season the San Antonio Spurs faced off against the Los Angeles Lakers at Staple’s Center in front of almost 19,000 fans.  Early this season the Spurs got the best of L.A. winning by 1 point, but this time around the Lakers were extremely dominant and imposed their will over the Spurs beating them with a final score of 99-85.

Jordan Farmar made an unexpected appearance as it was thought that he wouldn’t return until after the Allstar break due to his injury.  He played very aggressive and scored 14 points on 5 for 7 shooting.  Kobe Bryant was the high scorer for the Lakers with 22 points and Trevor Ariza was right behind him with 17 points in only 26 minutes of game time.  The Lakers have come together very well this year, playing even better ball than they did last year.  More than likely they will make it out of the Western Conference and whoever they face will have their hands full.

The Dallas Mavericks went into The Palace Of Auburn Hills and literally embarrassed the Detroit Pistons by defeating them by 21 points with extremely lackluster play by the whole Detroit squad.  The final score of the game was 112-91.  Trying to gain some rhythm and steady play, the Pistons coaches decided to take Richard Hamilton off the starting lineup recently and have him come off the bench.  It hasn’t seemed to change much as it looks like Detroit is struggling with their defense the most.

The top 3 scorers for the Mavericks were Dirk Nowitzki with 26 points, Josh Howard with 22 points and Brandon Bass with 18 points.  The team as a whole shot an impressive 54% and held the Pistons to a low 42%.  Dallas is hovering around the 8th spot in the Western Conference.  They better continue to play well or they could see themselves not even making the Playoffs this year.

Two of the big heavyweights in the Eastern Conference were in for a tough fight when the visiting Boston Celtics met up with the Orlando Magic.  Boston’s stifling defense locked down the shooters of the Magic throughout the entire game.  The Celtics once again showed their are dominance on the defensive end and came away with a win with a final score ending 90-80.

Ahead of the pack for Boston was Paul Pierce with 27 points on 8 for 18 field goal shooting.  Kevin Garnett had 16 points and Ray Allen had 12 points, rounding out the “Big 3″ with 55 points of their total points scored.  Glen “Big Baby” Davis was huge off the bench scoring 16 points and 4 rebounds.  A little more than halfway through the year and Boston continues to play Championship style basketball.