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SportsTalk: Albert Pujols signs with the Angels and Prince Fielder joins the Tigers. Which team is better now?
Ryan Callahan scored three goals as the New York Rangers beat Philadelphia 5-2 on Saturday for their seventh straight win over the Flyers.
Jeremy Lin hit a free throw with 4.9 seconds left to overcome a dreadful second half and lift the New York Knicks to their fifth straight victory, 100-98, over the Minnesota Timberwolves on Saturday night.
Arc's five up, five down: After No. 11 Michigan State's 58-48 upset of No. 3 Ohio State, you'd be a fool to discount the Spartans' national title chances now.
CFT: Jordan Jefferson makes it clear he wasn't happy with LSU's game plan in the Tigers' BCS Championship Game loss to Alabama.
Move over, Hollywood and NFL types, golf's two real A-listers take center stage Sunday at Pebble Beach, both in need of a win.
The United States swept favored Switzerland out of the Davis Cup on Saturday when Mardy Fish and Mike Bryan beat Roger Federer and Stanislas Wawrinka 4-6, 6-3, 6-3, 6-3.
Luis Suarez's refusal to shake hands with Patrice Evra overshadowed Manchester United's 2-1 win over rival Liverpool that lifted the defending champions to first place in the Premier League on Saturday.
Marlies Schild of Austria won her sixth World Cup slalom of the season Saturday after overall leader Lindsey Vonn and defending champion Maria Hoefl-Riesch crashed out in the opening run on the windy Pyrenees course.
Robins: It’s the Year of the Dragon on the Lunar calendar, and this Chinese influence could extend to it also being the year of the Pekingese on the green carpet at the 136th Westminster Dog Show on Tuesday.
AP
WALTHAM, Mass. - Long after practice ended, Ray Allen was still on the court firing up jumpers.
He was even making most of them.
That overtime work Monday showed that, like his Celtics teammates, he had plenty of energy left after two intense seven-game series. And the usually smooth shooter was regaining his rhythm.
Whether the Pistons still have theirs after a six-day layoff will become evident in Tuesday night’s opener of the Eastern Conference finals.
“I would rather have the rhythm” of regular competition than extra rest, Allen said, “because (with) the rhythm you don’t have to guess from one day to the next” how you’ll play.
Boston has played three games since Detroit won its conference semifinal in five games against Orlando last Tuesday. The Celtics advanced with a 97-92 victory over Cleveland on Sunday in which Paul Pierce scored 41 points. Allen had just four and averaged only 9.3 points on 32.8 percent shooting in the series, far below his regular-season performance.
If he starts scoring again, he would give the Celtics their usual three main scoring options, joining Kevin Garnett and Pierce, to go against a Pistons team that has a much more balanced offense than the Cavaliers, who lost Sunday despite 45 points from LeBron James, and Atlanta, Boston’s first-round opponent.
“It’s the exact opposite,” Celtics coach Doc Rivers said. “You go from Cleveland and Atlanta in a lot of ways with Joe Johnson, where you focus on double-teaming, to playing a team that all the guys in the starting lineup are capable of having good nights.”
The matchup with Detroit is what Rivers and many others expected.
Both are deep teams with outstanding defenses. The Celtics had the NBA’s best record (66-16), earning home-court advantage throughout the playoffs, and the Pistons were second best (59-23). The Celtics have plenty of players with playoff experience, though not as teammates, and the Pistons are in the conference finals for the sixth straight season.
Chauncey Billups, Richard Hamilton and Tayshaun Prince have been on all of those teams. Rasheed Wallace is in his fifth year with the Pistons. But they last won the NBA title in 2004, then lost to San Antonio the next year.
Pierce, Garnett and Allen are each in the conference finals for only the second time in their careers.
“I think we probably will be the underdog,” Pierce said, “knowing that Detroit has been there. They won a championship with this group and are used to going to the Eastern Conference finals and this is just our first trip.”
Still, the Pistons are hungry to get back to the finals for the first time since 2005.
“It’s only been three years, but it seems like forever,” Hamilton said. “We feel ... we haven’t been there in a long time. So we want to do everything possible to get right back to where we were at.”
Boston was 8-0 at home but 0-6 on the road in the first two rounds. The Pistons have three road wins in this postseason.
The Pistons didn’t have home-court advantage the last two times they won the conference finals in 2004 and 2005. Game 2 this week will be Thursday night in Boston, with the next two games Saturday and Monday in Detroit.
Jeremy Lin hit a free throw with 4.9 seconds left to overcome a dreadful second half and lift the New York Knicks to their fifth straight victory, 100-98, over the Minnesota Timberwolves on Saturday night.
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Jeremy Lin hit a free throw with 4.9 seconds left to overcome a dreadful second half and lift the New York Knicks to their fifth straight victory, 100-98, over the Minnesota Timberwolves on Saturday night.
Wesseling: Each NFL team enters the offseason with a series of pressing needs. Sometimes a team can address them all, sometimes they ignore them all. But if a team's smart, they'll listen to us. These are the most crucial aspects for AFC teams.
Doron Lamb hit a 3-pointer with 3:18 left to put No. 1 Kentucky ahead to stay, and the Wildcats took a big step toward a Southeastern Conference regular-season title by beating Vanderbilt 69-63 Saturday night for their 17th straight win.