Hooped Up

Back on Nov. 1, 1946, at Toronto’s Maple Leaf Gardens, New York’s Ossie Schectman scored the first basket in NBA history at Maple Leaf Gardens and yesterday Ben Gordon of the Detroit Pistons scored the 10 millionth point in NBA regular season history.

Gordon successfully converted on a jumper with 3:51 left in the second quarter of the Pistons’ game against the Philadelphia 76ers for the NBA milestone.

However, Kobe Bryant plays tonight and the 11 millionth point might be on its way.

After the jump, watch history.

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Okay, maybe the headline is a tad dramatic, but these bastards have lost 18 games in a row and they need a little positive reinforcement for finally bagging a win. After 38 days of racking up L’s, like a college freshman rack’s up Mom and Dad’s credit card bill.

The Nets beat the Charlotte Bobcats (ha-ha) 97-91 in front of 12,131 faithful fans at the IZOD Center. Notching their first win of the season –no seriously, they really won.

“Man, it’s a nice one to have off your back,” said Lopez, who dominated the Bobs for 31 points and 14 boards. “First win, now we have to string it together. It was definitely a great feeling in here.”

“It feels good. We brought great energy,” said Devin Harris, whose dive over three rows of seats in the final minute of the game illustrated that perfectly. “We didn’t play great at all times, but we fought through. They made a run, we didn’t fold.”

It’s good to see this group get a win because they actually compete every night. All they have to do know is win 9 more games to avoid finishing with the worst record in NBA history. Let’s see how this one plays out.

via NJ

The flu has been getting a bad wrap these days because of H1N1, but leave it to Nike to put a positive spin on it and package it with his Sickness Airness for your enjoyment. People that collect Jordan’s can never have enough and when the Air Jordan XXII “Flu Game” dropped, Jordan heads rushed these MJ’s too.

Of course these kicks are to celebrate MJ’s 38 point, 7 rebound, 5 assist and 3 steals performance against the Utah Jazz in Game 5 on the ‘97 NBA Finals.

Flash back to the game that created this re-release, after the jump

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During his first season in the NBA, Jordan averaged 28.2 ppg on 51.5% shooting and quickly became a fan favorite even in opposing arenas, and appeared on the cover of Sports Illustrated with the heading “A Star is Born” just over a month into his professional career. Jordan was also voted in as an All-Star starter by the fans in his rookie season.

6 NBA championships, 5 NBA MVP awards, and two NBA Slam Dunk Contest wins later, to list just a few of MJ’s accomplishments, Jordan will be in the Hall of  Fame and Sam Bowie will not. Just watching these highlights, you can see how hungry Jordan is right from the beginning. This cat did not mess around!

More MJ young kid swagger after the jump.

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The last time the Orlando Magic made it to the NBA finals the Houston Rockets owned them, like this guy owns the police. Sweeping the series in four straight games, becoming the first team in NBA history to win the championship as a sixth seed, and the first to beat four 50-win teams in a single postseason en route to the championship.

In game one of the NBA Finals, with the Magic up by three late in the game. Nick Anderson, typically a 70% free throw shooter, missed four consecutive free throws that could have sealed the victory for Orlando. Kenny Smith then hit a three-pointer for Houston, tying the game and sending it to overtime. The Rockets went on to win the game in overtime and eventually swept the Magic, winning their second consecutive NBA Championship. As a result some Orlando fans began to call Nick Anderson  ”Nick the Brick” and “Brick Anderson”.

14 years later, Kenny Smith though he would remind Nick Anderson of that  nightmare by reenacts his 3-point performance against the Magic in the 1995 finals. Why? Because it’s funny and Kenny “Jet” Smith still has a silky smooth jumper. 

The original moment after the jump, with dramatic music and Nick Anderson and Kenny Smith talking about that night.

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The game that every Knicks fan remembers like a bad dream that seemed to unreal to happen.  In the dying minutes of a playoff game against the Knicks in the Garden. Reggie Miller capped a 31-point game by scoring eight points over an 8.9-second span. Stealing a game from the Knicks in game 1 of the 1995 Eastern Conference Semifinals.

This was ridiculous!

One of the greatest centers to ever play the game and just as silent as the new leader of the Spurs Tim Duncan.  When I saw his stat line on SportsCenter, I really thought it was a mistake.  How the hell does somebody score 71 points. Then I realized it was against the Clippers.

71 points sealed the deal to beat Shaq on the final regular season night  for the 1993 – 1994 scoring title.

Legendary is a new segment of amazing / historical NBA events

I watched this game and I was amazed, that nobody body checked Kobe Bryant at about 50 points.  This was Kobe Bryant at his deadliest and I don’t know if we’ll see another performance like this from a guard for another 10 years.  

Kobe was definitely out to prove a point that night and Phil Jackson was all green lights.  I just want to know, what the heck was Sam Mitchell telling his players to stop the “Black Mamba”.  

I would have advised a strong hip-check.