Utah Game 4 thoughts

Sad news in the afternoon leading up to the game - Tex Winter has suffered a stroke, falling in the bathtub while at Kansas State attending a reunion of one of his old teams. Our prayers are with Tex and his family.

******

On to happier things...
Well, that was (finally) a championship performance, wasn't it?

1st Quarter:
* Kobe taking lots of shots. Making them, but you hope thsi doesn't encourage him that it's a good idea to take 30+ (he did not, only 24, a sign of maturity).

* Okur looks ok early - he misses a 3 and runs a long way to get to his own miss (but he did not look ok afterward, maybe he re-tweaked it?).

* Kobe finally goes to the hole to make it 15-14, a good sign in that he is not always settling.

* Offensive rebounds are killing us AGAIN, 4 early ones are why we are behind at this point (they ended up only getting 11/49, nice turnaround).

* Ariza hurt his ankle, I did not see it but hope he returns (turns out he hurt it by stepping on Powell's foot in pregame warmups!)

* Harpring is hurting us again - with his play, not his banging.

2nd Quarter:
* Lamar bricks his second long jumper...time to put on the shock collar.

* Luke, then Sasha, then Brown hit consecutive 3's to go from 7 down to 2 up, big swing at a time we looked a little down.

* Sasha hits another 3, we keep kicking ass, and in some great defense and the run extends out to 20-2 for suddenly an 11 point lead. Wow.

* Ariza is apparently ok, but not moving as well as normal.

* Bynum checks in and immediately lets Boozer rebound a missed free throw (not his own) and score. That's a good way to lose minutes.

* 14/20 shooting int he 2nd, and a 40 point quarter, great stuff, but...

* You've got to be kidding...at the end of the half, Walton is inbounding and everybody runs downcourt...he throws a 50 foot pass toward Kobe that is easily picked off, and DWill gets a driving layup and the and-1 to cut it to 7 (from 12 with 10 seconds to go. That is just awful.

3rd Quarter:
* Kobe starts the 2nd half hot, and is now 14/17 from the floor. Don't shoot out of it, Kobe (He doesn't, finshing with 24 shots).

* Boozer airballed a free throw and they let Utah rebound it - how did all 3 refs miss seeing that?

* Seeing the coaches wearing the Chuck Daly pin makes me wonder if they will add a Tex Winter pin, or maybe combine the two? That this man who has been so influential in the game for over 6 decades is not in the Hall of Fame continues to gall me, and now it may be too late for him to enjoy it if he does get there...bastards.

* Man, there are lots of blondes in Utah crowds. I can see why Beau moved there.

* Luke was mugged twice in a row, hope he left his wallet in the locker room!

* If Utah had this Carlos Boozer all year, the healthy beastly version, they are a 60 win team. It will be interesting to see if he exercises his early termination option and tests the market in this economy.

* ESPN is showing promos for Spankees-BlowSox Sunday night. Id rather wax my car using a toothbrush than watch that crap.

4th Quarter:
* Lots more Luke, and not as much Ariza, hopefully he will be ok. Ending it Monday will help him recover. (It turns out that Luke also hurt his ankle, and I don't like the way they described it as it was not a normal roll, hopefully HE'S ok. This is why you need ot get these things over as fast as is possible).

* Kyle Korver's mom once scored 73 points in a game, wow.

* As you can tell by my rambling from mid third on, no blown leads today!

Okay, back home for the Monday game where we shoudl get this thing finished. Houston is up 3-1 on Portland and looking like the likely second round opponent, although games 2-4 were very competitive so it's not a lock. I suspect that we would not start before next Sunday anyway, so you get a nice rest and time for the injured Ariza and Walton, as well as time to get Bynum some work, by closing it out tonight - let's get that done.