Why, KD? Why? Count on Kevin Durant and the Thunder to screw up a perfectly good story. With Philly leading OKC for almost the entire game, we were all set to officially jump on the Sixers’ bandwagon until Oklahoma City came back to send the game into overtime, where they ended up winning by five. Durant (34 points, 16 rebounds) was a force of nature and had five straight points to end regulation, including a curl three to tie it with three seconds left. There wasn’t a whole lot Andre Iguodala could do to handle Durant, even coming off his destruction of Danny Granger on Tuesday night. The Philly color guys crooned, “With all respect to Danny Granger, this is not Danny Granger. This is a guy on another planet.” Between Durant and Russell Westbrook (27 points, 12 rebounds), Philly could never get the momentum back in the extra session. It’s hard to beat a team that has two superheroes … No one is talking about this Sixers team. Read More »

Is it ever acceptable to settle for mediocrity? In the NBA, more times than not, being mediocre can still land you millions of dollars. But Michael Jordan has never been known as mediocre. The Charlotte Bobcats have been a mediocre team since they were founded in 2004. Believe it or not, when the Bobcats moved their second best player in Gerald Wallace for Joel Przybilla, Dante Cunningham, Sean Marks, and two first-round draft picks, they took a step in the direction to being a relevant franchise in a few years. Read More »

Beast of the Night: Brandon Jennings finished with 27 points, three rebounds, seven assists, three steals, two blocks and two three-pointers last night. He shot 41 percent (7-17) from the field, 92 percent (11-12) from the free-throw line and had just one turnover. Jennings has been pretty solid for much of this month so far, but his Achilles heel continues to be his poor shooting from the field. This isn’t going to change anytime soon. Read More »

Trying to stop a three-game losing streak, start the post-All-Star portion of the season on a good note, and simply protect their home court against one of the NBA’s better teams, the Lakers had a big test in front of them against the Hawks. We just didn’t know it was as big as Chris Webber made it sound. “They need to put the fear of this sport into others,” C-Webb said. So the Lakers needed to make the Hawks fear basketball? That’s heavy … But they may have done just that. Derek Fisher got the ball rolling, sticking three straight jumpers after tip-off to help L.A. get out to an 8-0 lead before Atlanta scored. Read More »

As sad as it is, there are less than two months remaining in the 2010-11 NBA regular season, which means fantasy basketball leagues are quickly approaching their playoff schedule. Most playoff matchups begin in Week 21 (March 14) or Week 22 (March 21), which is coming quicker than the next Carmelo Anthony trade rumor. Well, maybe not that quickly, but you get the idea. Read More »

Beast of the Night: Josh Smith gave his owners some love on Valentine’s Day with a line of 27 points, 14 rebounds, three assists, three steals and one three-pointer. He shot 65 percent (11-17) from the floor, 100 percent (4-4) from the free-throw line and had five turnovers. Smith is averaging season-high marks in his shooting from the field, scoring, rebounding and steals so far in February. He’s also shooting free throws a lot better lately. Read More »

Somebody call Smush Parker and tell him to dust off his purple kicks. Because if Kobe Bryant is at all missing the time he played with Kwame Brown, a 10-day for Smush in L.A. could be in the cards … OK, so Kobe didn’t say he misses Kwame — he didn’t say anything at all — but during last night’s loss to the Bobcats, Kobe had to notice Kwame was outplaying his more talented opposition for key stretches simply because he went harder. Read More »

Weekend Wonder: LaMarcus Aldridge averaged 36.5 points, seven rebounds, 2.5 assists, two steals and 1.5 blocks in two games over the weekend. He shot 62 percent from the field, 84 percent from the line and averaged 2.5 turnovers. Aldridge has been on a tear lately and is posting top-five averages in the last month. His owners have to hope that things don’t change too much once Marcus Camby returns later this week. Read More »

Beast of the Night: Dorell Wright put up 23 points, 11 rebounds, eight assists, four steals and hit four threes. He shot 40 percent (8-20) from the field, 75 percent (3-4) from the free-throw line and had no turnovers. Wright continues to play heavy minutes and put up big-time numbers. He’s clearly no fluke and is making his owners look like geniuses. Read More »

The Big Three was down to the Chosen One for last night’s Heat/Pistons game, which naturally meant for LeBron James that the role of fourth-quarter hero would fall into the hands of — Eddie House? … With five minutes left in the fourth, the Pistons were up three before House tied it with a corner trey. A few possessions later, House hit an off-balance jumper from the wing. Then after Austin Daye’s triple with one minute left put Detroit up by one, House ended up with the ball in his hands with the final seconds ticking down. Read More »