Basketball Daily

On Sunday the Detroit Pistons headed into the champ’s house of the Boston Celtics and avoided a season sweep by playing intense defense and all around great ball.  Glen “Big Baby” Davis played very well in place of Kevin Garnett but it was not enough as the Iverson-less Pistons showed why they were the 6 time Eastern Conference finalists, by taking the victory with the final score being 105-95.

All 5 starters for the Pistons were in double figures with Richard “Rip” Hamilton leading the way with 25 points on 6 for 12 field goal shooting.  Off the bench Walter Hermann showed his talent level by scoring 11 points on 4 for 5 shooting in only 16 minutes of game time.  Rasheed Wallace picked up another technical during this game which brings his total to 15 on the season.  One more and he will have to sit out the following game due to the new rules stating, if a player receives 16 on the year they will be forced to miss the next regular season game.

Without Carlos Boozer the Utah Jazz have been struggling but when they met up against the Champion Boston Celtics there offense and defense were firing on all cylinders.  Many people don’t like watching the grind it out games like this one, but I sure do.  It shows the talent level of all players when they have hording defense all over them.  Kevin Garnett left for the locker room late in the second quarter with a knee tweak and failed to return in the second half, due to the coach Doc Rivers playing it on the safe side.  This probably cost them the game as down the stretch the Jazz pulled ahead slightly and got the win with a final score that ended 90-85.

The top 3 scorers for the Jazz were Mehmet Okur with 19 points, Deron Williams with 18 points and Ronnie Brewer with 16 points.  The only other player in double figures was Andrei Kirilenko with 13 points off the bench.  The Jazz are the 8th seed currently with only 3 games separating 5 teams.  Boozer is expected to return next week and if he is 100% watch the Jazz shoot up the list in the West.

The San Antonio Spurs came to the champions house of the Boston Celtics and a battle between ring holders ensued.  It was one fantastic game, where in the first half it was an offensive spree and the second half was lock down defense.  The Spurs ended up prevailing with the help of some unlikely heroes including Matt Bonner’s 23 points, George Hill’s 7 points and Roger Mason’s dagger of a 3 with under a minute left in the game.  The final score ended at 105-99.

The Spurs shot 48% from the field committing only 13 turnovers.  Allstar Tim Duncan had 23 points and 13 rebounds with 5 assists.  Manu Ginobili was high man off the bench with 19 points on 6 for 11 shooting.  This was a big win for the Spurs, it puts there chances in perspective for competing for another title against the NBA’s best Celtics.  The Spurs improve their record on the season to 34 wins and 15 losses.