NBA-MVP AWARD
Durant wins honor
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) β Oklahoma City’s Kevin Durant has dethroned LeBron James as the NBA’s Most Valuable Player. He led the Thunder to the second best record in the league at 59-23 by winning his fourth scoring title in five years. James had won the last two MVP awards and four of the last five.
Durant totaled 1,232 points in the voting of sportscasters and writers while James was second with 891 points. Durant averaged 32 points a game along with 7.4 rebounds and 5.5 assists a game. At one point he had 41 straight games of 25 or more points in a game.
NBA-CLIPPERS
Club president taking indefinite leave of absence
LOS ANGELES (AP) β Los Angeles Clippers President Andy Roeser is taking an indefinite leave of absence while the NBA restructures the franchise in the wake of owner Donald Sterling’s lifetime ban.
Roeser’s immediate departure was announced Tuesday by the NBA. The league announced plans last week to appoint a CEO to oversee the franchise in Sterling’s absence.
An NBA spokesman says the move will “provide an opportunity for a new CEO to begin on a clean slate and for the team to stabilize under difficult circumstances.”
NBA-WARRIORS
Jackson fired
OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) β The Golden State Warriors have fired coach Mark Jackson. The move comes in the wake of the Warriors’ elimination from the playoffs in the first round by the Clippers in seven games. Jackson had the job for three seasons and compiled a record of 121-109. The Warriors were 51-31 this season. Jackson was just the third coach in team history to have a 50-win season, joining Don Nelson and Al Attles.
NBA-RAPTORS
New deal for the coach
TORONTO (AP) β The Toronto Raptors have rewarded coach Dwane Casey with a three-year contract extension. The Raptors won a franchise-record 48 games this season. This was Casey’s third season with the team, which won the Atlantic Division for the second time and ended a six-year playoff drought, losing to Brooklyn in seven games in the first round.
NBA-76ERS
NBA rookie of year has shoulder surgery
PHILADELPHIA (AP) β Philadelphia 76ers guard and NBA Rookie of the Year Michael Carter-Williams has undergone successful surgery to repair the labrum of his right shoulder. There is no timetable set for his recovery.
Team president and general manager Sam Hinkie says Carter-Williams had the surgery now to allow for maximum recovery time.
Carter-Williams was only the third player since 1950-51 to lead all rookies in scoring (16.7), rebounding (6.3) and assists (6.2), joining Oscar Robertson (1960-61) and Alvan Adams (1975-76).
NBA PLAYOFFS-SCHEDULE
Heat and Nets, Spurs and Blazers open play
UNDATED (AP) β The final two NBA conference semifinals start play this evening with games in Miami and San Antonio. On the court of the defending champion Heat, Miami fans are going to watch their team square off with the Brooklyn Nets. The Heat advanced to the second round with a four-game sweep of the Bobcats while the Nets eliminated the Raptors in seven games. Surprisingly the Nets swept the season series against the Heat 4-0. In the 25 previous best-of-seven playoff series in which one team won all four regular season games, the team that prevailed during the season won the playoff as well.
Game 2 in the series will take place Thursday night in Miami.
In San Antonio the Spurs are facing the Blazers after eliminating the Mavericks in seven games. The Blazers got this far with a six-game-series win over the Houston Rockets. The second game in this series will be played Thursday night as well, once again in San Antonio. The Spurs and Blazers split the four games they played this season.
NHL PLAYOFFS-SCHEDULE
A night of Game 3 NHL action
UNDATED (AP) β The third game in two NHL playoff series is being played tonight with Montreal hosting Boston and Chicago playing at Minnesota.
North of the border the Canadiens are hosting the Bruins in the first of two games on their ice. In Boston the teams split the first two games with Montreal winning Game 1 in overtime 4-3 and Boston coming back for a 5-3 win in Game 2. The fourth game will be played Thursday night in Montreal.
For the Wild and Blackhawks it’s Game 3 in St. Paul and the home standing Wild need a win, badly. The Wild dropped the first two games of the series in Chicago 5-2 and 4-1 and face the prospect of going down 0-3 in the series. The next game will take place Friday night in Minnesota.
NHL-PREDATORS
New coach in Nashville
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) β The Nashville Predators have hired Peter Laviolette (lah-vee-uh-LET’) as their new coach, making him only the second head coach in the franchise’s history. General manager David Poile (poyl) says that Laviolette’s experience of having won a Stanley Cup as a coach shows he knows what it will take to help the Predators improve.
Laviolette, who signed a multi-year contract, coached Carolina to a Stanley Cup in 2006 and took Philadelphia to the Stanley Cup finals in 2010. He was fired in October after the Flyers lost their first three games of the season.
MLB-SCHEDULE
Braves look to end losing skid
UNDATED (AP) β The Atlanta Braves fell out of first place in the National League East last night when they lost and the Nationals won. The defeat for the Braves was their seventh straight, and tonight they’ll look to get back on the winning track with a home game against St. Louis.
The Giants and Tigers are the hottest teams in baseball right now as each has won six straight. The Giants look for No. 7 tonight in Pittsburgh, while the Tigers are home to the Astros.
The tightest division in baseball in the early going of the season is the American League East where last place is shared by three teams, all just 1 Β½ games back of the first place Orioles, who lead second place New York by just a percentage point. Tonight the Orioles are at Tampa, the Blue Jays are in Philadelphia, the Red Sox are hosting the Reds and the Angels are home to the Yankees.
Here’s how the rest of this evening’s schedule looks:
The Twins are in Cleveland facing the Indians. For the second straight game, Twins first baseman Joe Mauer is sitting out with back spasms.
Elsewhere, the New York Mets are in Miami, the Cubs are home to the White Sox, Arizona is at Milwaukee, the Rangers and Rockies are playing in Denver, Oakland is entertaining the Mariners and Kansas City is at San Diego.
NFL-WASHINGTON’S FOOTBALL TEAM
NY lawmakers urge name change
ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) β A bipartisan group of New York lawmakers says the NFL should pressure the Washington Redskins to change its name.
The group plans to introduce a resolution denouncing the football team’s use of the word “redskin” and urging team owner Daniel Snyder to pick a new name. If the resolution passes, New York lawmakers would join a growing list of those criticizing the team’s name, including members of Congress from both parties.
Democratic Assemblyman Keith Wright says the word “is absolutely offensive to the Native American community and beyond.”
OBIT-ELLIS
Former heavyweight champ dies
LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) β Former heavyweight boxing champion Jimmy Ellis, who trained with fellow Louisville fighter Muhammad Ali and squared off against some of his era’s best fighters, has died in his hometown. He was 74. His brother says Ellis had been suffering from Alzheimer’s disease in recent years.
Ellis defeated Jerry Quarry to win the WBA crown in 1968. Ellis defended the title by defeating Floyd Patterson, but was stopped by Joe Frazier in a fight to unify the world heavyweight championship in 1970. He was stopped by Ali in the 12th round of their bout in 1971.
COLLEGE FOOTBALL
New pact for Stoops
LEXINGTON, Ky. (AP) β Kentucky has extended the contract of head football coach Mark Stoops through the 2018 season. The team struggled in Stoops’ first season, going 2-9 overall and 0-7 in the Southeastern Conference, but attendance was up by just under 10,000 fans a game. Total attendance averaged 59,472 per game.
TRACK-4-MINUTE MILE
Record barrier smashed 60 years ago
OXFORD, England (AP) β It was 60 years ago today that England’s Roger Bannister broke the fabled 4-minute mile. At the time it was strongly believed that it was humanly impossible for a man or woman to run a mile in less than four minutes. On May 6, 1954, Bannister proved the skeptics wrong on a track in Oxford, England, when he ran a mile in 3 minutes, 59.4 seconds. The now 85-year old Bannister says “it was a target,” as the previous world record of 4:01.04 had stood since 1945.
The current world record was set in 1999 at 3:43.13.
