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TNT's NBA Playoffs Ratings Up

The games are averaging 2.3 million households per night and all male demos are up between 25-30 percent.


John Consoli

APRIL 24, 2008 -

TNT’s NBA playoff ratings, through nine games, are averaging a 2.1 household rating, up 16 percent over last year, according to Nielsen Media Research data.

The games are averaging 2.3 million households per night and all male demos are up between 25-30 percent.

TNT will continue to televise the playoff games through the months of April and May, concluding with its exclusive coverage of the NBA Western Conference finals.

NBA Top Ten Plays for April 24th

The Denver Nuggets couldn't defend Pau Gasol in Game 1 or Kobe Bryant in Game 2.

So, what makes them think they can turn things around in their first-round playoff series against the Los Angeles Lakers?

"We're home, man," Allen Iverson said. "They got a chance to play in front of their home crowd, and we want that same type of advantage playing in front of ours."

The homecourt is about the only thing the Nuggets have successfully defended all season.

They rode the energy of the Pepsi Center to a 33-8 record, including a series of clutch must-win triumphs over the final six weeks that allowed them to reach the playoffs for the fifth straight season.

"It's our turn to hold serve," Nuggets coach George Karl said Thursday. "It's a great challenge, a lot of fun. The homecourt's been kind of our biggest ally all year long."

Game 3 is Saturday and Game 4 is Monday night.

The Nuggets looked haggard as they filtered out of film study Thursday, most of them not wanting to stop and talk about being in a 2-0 hole after allowing a staggering 250 points so far.

"I think it might just be a travel day of getting to bed at 4:30 in the morning," Karl said. "There's a heaviness to waiting sometimes. We'll have a good practice tomorrow. I thought we got a little bit better last night. We didn't get better enough to win the game, but we got a little bit better."

The Nuggets hung with the Lakers until the fourth quarter after watching Gasol tear them up for 36 points in a 128-114 loss in Game 1. But Bryant scored 19 points in a 4:19 stretch of the fourth quarter, leading L.A. to a 122-107 win Wednesday night.

The Nuggets, however, insist they'll show up Saturday with a swagger and not a stagger.

"My sense is all year long when this team had its true back to the wall, they've responded great and the homecourt's been a big part of that," Karl said. "I think there's an energy out there. Statistically there's all sorts of positives that come our way here. We play better defence here. We make people miss more shots here. ..."

And all those clutch wins late in the season give the Nuggets plenty of confidence they can come back on L.A.

"Well, to us they were pretty much like playoff games," Marcus Camby said. "Going down that stretch, especially, late March and all of April, were all must-wins. So, we pretty much know how to perform under pressure."

The Nuggets ranked next-to-last in the NBA by allowing 107 points a game in the regular season despite leading the league in both blocks (6.72) and steals (9.17). So, it's not surprising the Lakers have piled up 250 points.

"It's a high-paced game," Gasol said. "They keep it real fast, an up-and-down game. You take advantage of what they give you."

Opponents haven't had as much success against the Nuggets in Denver, and Bryant said it's imperative for the Lakers to duplicate their energy, execution and emotion on the road to change that.

"Not getting too high, not getting too low. Even keel, keeping our poise," Bryant said. "They're a great home team. I think altitude is a factor the first few minutes. They play with a lot of energy.

"I think we're doing OK, we're playing typical playoff basketball. That being said, we haven't put together four explosive quarters that I think we're capable of. The important thing is getting the Ws."

Lakers point guard Derek Fisher isn't expecting any surprises from the Nuggets in Game 3, either.

"I don't think you're going to see wholesale changes. They believe in their style of play," Fisher said. "Defensively, I think they'll play even more zone than we saw last night. I don't expect them to do too many things differently than they've done so far. I just expect them to do them better on their home court."

So do the Nuggets.

"We still feel good about ourselves," Linas Kleiza said. "We've got to do what we're supposed to do, and that's defend our homecourt. We've been good all year at our home, so it should be exciting if we do that and the series is back where it started."

Notes: Ronny Turiaf, who missed Game 2 with tonsillitis, is expected to make the trip to Denver on Friday. ... Karl on his son, Coby, playing against the Nuggets in Game 2: "It's a proud moment for the family that is to be cherished and celebrated. But it will not be done in the next two weeks."

Stephon Marbury is continuing his rehabilitation from ankle surgery in Phoenix, according to a source. Marbury is hopeful of returning to the Knicks for the final year of his contract, but it is believed that Walsh will attempt to trade the controversial point guard during the offseason. Jackson and Thibodeau would both welcome the opportunity to work with Marbury

But the Suns didn’t have a healthy Hill while losing the first two playoff games in San Antonio, and likely won’t have him at all for a must-win Game 3 tonight at US Airways Center.

Hill didn’t practice again Thursday and had a precautionary MRI exam, hoping to shed more light on exactly what he’s dealing with. But he hasn’t been able to go 100 percent since over-striding during a fast break attempt 10 days ago against Golden State. His abdominal/groin problems are no better.

Shooting is painful for Hill. So are running, moving laterally and any other quick reactions.

Coach Mike D’Antoni said Hill won’t play tonight in Game 3 unless he is 100 percent, which is exactly what he said before Hill pronounced himself ready an hour before tipoff in Game 2. [East Valley Tribune]

Alabama State basketball player Deshean Porchea collapsed and died after playing in a pickup game on campus.

The 19-year-old sophomore passed out Wednesday afternoon after walking off the court and never regained consciousness, the university said.

University spokeswoman Janel Bell said an autopsy was being performed Thursday to try to determine the cause of death. Alabama State planned a candlelight vigil Thurdsay "He was just a good all-around kid," said ASU coach Lewis Jackson, who heard the news while on a recruiting trip in Florida. "He played with a contagious fire that carried over to his teammates. He was a good person. It is a great loss to our team and our university."

Thanks to the stress fracture in his left foot, Yao Ming hasn't played a minute for the Houston Rockets in the last two months. That doesn't mean, though, that his footprints aren't all over this first-round playoff series with the Jazz.
Quite literally, in fact, with three of Yao's teammates wearing Chinese brand basketball shoes. Forget Nike, Reebok or Adidas. Shane Battier, Chuck Hayes and Luis Scola have six- and seven-figure endorsement deals with Peak, Li-Ning and Anta, respectively.
"While I would love to believe that it's because of my overwhelming charisma and personality," Battier said, "I think it has something to do with Yao."
t is perhaps the greatest tribute
Jazz Playoff Cheer Contest
Enter The Salt Lake Tribune's Jazz playoffs cheer contest! We're looking for original cheers, the more creative the better! to the globalization of the NBA. While Yao wears an American brand of shoes (Reebok), his teammates have cashed in with Chinese companies simply by wearing the same uniform as Yao.
"Every game," Hayes said, "I get millions of people over there in Asia watching us and supporting me, and people, they see that I'm wearing Li-Ning, so I guess that brings up my fan base even more."
Joking with Scola at Thursday's pregame shootaround, Yao said he wanted a free dinner from his teammates, if not a piece of their contracts. "Are there any shoe company in Argentina interested about me?" Yao asked Scola.
"If Yao wore a Chinese shoe," Battier said, "I don't think there'd be any deals for us over here, so we're happy with Yao and Reebok."
For all the recent news reports about lead contamination in Chinese exports - children's toys, in particular - Battier said his Peaks are as good as any shoe he has worn.
"I toured the factory," Battier said, "and where my shoe was made, it was very well ventilated and well lit and labor practices seemed on the up and up."
The Rockets quietly claim the Chinese shoe contracts give them a potential edge in free agency. The deals are believed to be worth between $300,000 (for a player like Hayes) to $1 million or more for Battier and Steve Francis, who signed with Anta.
An undrafted and undersized forward, Hayes can forever boast that he has his own shoe deal. Li-Ning approached his agent last season and Hayes surprised Yao one day when he showed up to practice wearing the sneakers.
"Yao can vouch for me," Hayes said. "Out of the three shoe companies, mine is the best one. Yao said mine was by far the best one. Over there, I have the best shoe. So I would like to say I'm wearing the Nikes of China."
The three are featured on billboards in the country's biggest cities. Battier said every NBA game broadcast in China goes to break with a Peak commercial starring himself and returns from break with the same commercial a second time.
"I'm much more famous in China than I think I ever was in America, which is kind of cool," Battier said.
Rockets forward Mike Harris, who played in China earlier this season before signing with Houston last month, can attest to how tired he grew of seeing Battier on television.
"The commercial plays over and over," Harris said. "It got kind of repetitive. I got tired of watching it, so I just stopped watching TV. I started watching movies."
While Nikes retail for $100 or more, Chinese sneakers cost about half that, said Wang Meng, who covers the Rockets for Titan Sports, the country's largest sports newspaper. Li-Ning is the most established brand, but Anta is making inroads.
Approximately 70 Rockets games each season are broadcast in China, Wang added, making them China's adopted national team. He said the endorsement deals were far more cost effective than paying to advertise on government-run television.
Li-Ning has deals with NBA players Shaquille O'Neal and Damon Jones while Rockets owner Leslie Alexander reportedly has a $30 million stake in Anta. The biggest question, though, is whether Yao ever will wear a Chinese brand.
"There are a lot of Chinese shoe companies that really want to sign Yao when he becomes a free agent," Wang said. "There will be a fight, just like three, four years ago Nike and Reebok fight so hard to try to sign Yao."

Scoring seven points in a quarter is normally nothing for Tracy McGrady.With his team down 2-0 in the opening round of the playoffs, it meant everything to the Houston Rockets.

McGrady scored all of those seven in the final 3:29, finally snapping out of a fourth-quarter slump and finishing with 27 to lead Houston to a 94-92 victory over the Utah Jazz on Thursday night that gave the Rockets life in a series that could have been headed for a sweep.

"This was a very emotional win for us,'' said McGrady, who had scored one point total in the fourth quarter of the first two games of the series. "We played like we really didn't want to go home early. We played with a lot of passion and a lot of heart.''

The Rockets were trailing the best-of-seven series 2-0 and coming to Utah, where the Jazz had the best home record in the NBA. One of Utah's four losses in Salt Lake City was to Houston, which won the Jazz's home opener and did it again when it mattered much, much more.

Rafer Alston added 20 points and five assists in his first game in nearly two weeks. Carl Landry had 11 rebounds and two blocks, swatting away Deron Williams' shot that could have won it for the Jazz just before the buzzer. Landry also sacrificed his left front tooth, courtesy of an elbow from Utah's Carlos Boozer in the second quarter, and had a huge gap in his post-game grin.

Landry said he was seeing double after the elbow and was bleeding from the mouth as he was led to the locker room, but was back for the second half.

"This was a big game. It doesn't matter if you've got a hurt toe or a hurt back, whatever the case may be,'' Landry said. "No matter what it is, football, hockey, basketball. It's part of playing sports.''

Game 4 is Saturday back in Utah, where the Jazz were 37-4 this season. Instead of playing for a sweep, the Jazz will try to avoid doing the same thing Houston did in last year's opening round against Utah. The Rockets won the first two games of that series, then lost the next two and eventually the series in seven games.

The Rockets, who are without 7-foot-6 center Yao Ming, outscored Utah in the paint 40-26.

"They showed how much they wanted to win a ballgame,'' Utah coach Jerry Sloan said. "They scored 40 points in the paint. I thought they brought it to us all night long.''

Williams had 28 points and 12 assists.

Carlos Boozer had 15 points and 13 rebounds, and Mehmet Okur scored 12 and pulled down 11 boards for the Jazz, whose poor free throw shooting caught up with them in the fourth quarter when McGrady started scoring.

The Jazz went 20-for-33 from the foul line, getting 11 more chances than Houston (16-for-22) but failing to capitalize.

"Free throws definitely hurt us. You lose a game by two points and you miss 13 free throws, it's definitely frustrating,'' Williams said.

The poor shooting from the line and the resurgence of McGrady were enough to guarantee the Rockets will be hosting a Game 5 next week.

"No one thought we could win in Utah. I don't like the term 'stole' because that implies that we didn't play well,'' said Houston's Shane Battier, who scored 12. "We finally did a good job of executing our game plan. We took away what we wanted to take away.''

McGrady tied the game at 86 on a foul shot with 3:29 left, then gave the Rockets the lead with two more from the line with 2:50 remaining. He added a 19-foot jumper with 2:16 to go - his first fourth-quarter field goal of the series - then followed with a 20-footer to give the Rockets a 92-86 lead.

As he was shooting, Landry was drawing a foul on Andrei Kirilenko away from the ball. The basket counted and Landry made the free throw to convert the unusual three-point play and give Houston a 93-86 lead.

But the Jazz weren't done.

Kyle Korver hit a 3-pointer, McGrady was called for an offensive foul and Okur hit another 3 to draw the Jazz within 93-92 with 37 seconds left. McGrady missed at the other end and the Jazz had a chance to win, but Landry blocked Williams' shot from the lane and the rebound went to Luis Scola, who was fouled and went 1-for-2 from the line with 0.2 seconds left.

After a timeout, the Jazz threw away the inbounds pass.

Scola had 16 points and 10 rebounds.

Ronnie Brewer scored 12 and Matt Harpring added 10 points for the Jazz.

Notes: Alston returned after missing four games with a strained right hamstring and made his first five shots, including three 3-pointers. ... After opening the game 9-for-29, the Jazz closed the second quarter on a 6-for-9 stretch to tie it at 44. ... Houston held Utah without a field goal for the first 5:07 of the second quarter. ... Thursday was the first time in the series Houston did not trail at halftime. ... The Jazz were 10-for-17 (59 percent) from the foul line in the first half.
Copyright 2007 by STATS LLC and Associated Press. Any commercial use or distribution without the express written consent of STATS LLC and Associated Press is strictly prohibited

Toronto Raptors beat Orlando Magic 108-94

The things that came seemingly so easy to the Orlando Magic in the first two games of this series disappeared in Thursday’s Game 3 under an avalanche of errors, defensive gaffes and clanging jump shots.
And because the Magic seemed at times as rattled in Toronto as the Raptors were in Orlando earlier in the week, this once-lopsided series could be up for grabs once again.

A Toronto team left for dead just days earlier overwhelmed the rattled Magic in the first half and made all of the necessary plays down the stretch in a 108-94 Game 3 whipping of the Magic.

Orlando still leads the best-of-series series 2-1. Game 4 is Saturday at 3 p.m. (TNT). It assures that there will be a Game 5 Monday night back in Orlando’s Amway Arena.

The Magic worked hard to stay in the game in the second half, but couldn’t overcome a deficit that swelled to as much as 23 points in the second quarter. Orlando got as close as nine points seconds into the final period, but missed several chances against a Toronto team that was playing with a tremendous sense of desperation.

Orlando entered the game brimming with confidence because of the way that it played on the road during the regular season. Orlando tied the Los Angeles Lakers for the NBA’s second-best road record (27-14) this season, trailing only Boston (31-10). The 27 road wins were the most in Magic franchise history, more than the Magic team that made the 1995 NBA Finals (18 road wins) and more than the 1996 team (23 road victories) that won 57 overall and reached the Eastern Conference Finals.

Magic franchise center Dwight Howard had 19 points and 12 rebounds, but his teammates couldn’t match his firepower. Point guard Jameer Nelson, who averaged 21 points in the first two games, did not score until 2:27 was left, scored just four points and missed six of his eight shots. And Hedo Turkoglu, Orlando’s second-leading scorer this season, had 26 points but just seven field goals. Rashard Lewis chipped in with 19 points.

Orlando turned the ball over 14 times, leading to a whopping 24 Toronto points. And they had no answer for a Toronto team that spread the floor and rained in 12 3-pointers. The Raptors’ balance was so good that they won easily on a night when all-star forward Chris Bosh managed just three first-half points and 15 for the game.

The Magic made 801 3-pointers during the regular season, the second most in NBA history, but they remained stuck in a slump from beyond the arc. Orlando missed on 14 of its first 16 3-pointers in the first half. They hit just six of 27 tries for the game (22.2 percent).

Since the first quarter of Game 1, when Orlando opened the series with nine 3s in 11 tries, the Magic have made just 17 of 75 (22.7) 3-pointers.
Embattled Toronto point guard T.J. Ford, who entered the game having missed 15 of 17 shots and facing calls that he be benched in favor of reserve Jose Calderon, scored 18 first-half points as the Raptors jumped to a 61-40 halftime lead.
Ford keyed a game-turning 16-0 run late in the second quarter with 11 rapid-fire points. He took advantage of Jameer Nelson’s foul trouble and had his way with reserve Carlos Arroyo, repeatedly getting into the lane. Ford made six of eight shots and all five of his free throws in the first half.

Orlando contributed to its own woes by shooting a dismal 40.5 percent and turning the ball over 11 times, leading to 20 Toronto points.

Howard had 15 points and seven rebounds for the Magic, making seven of 10 shots (five dunks). However, his teammates were lost offensively and connected on just eight of 27 tries. The Magic’s four guards were just one of 11, while Lewis missed five of eight shots.

Toronto had control of the game even though Bosh had just one field goal and three points in the first half.

Outscored 78-41 in the first quarters of the opening two games in Orlando, Toronto instead was the team that jumped to a fast start Thursday. The Magic’s early shooting and turnover problems allowed the Raptors to build a 26-13 before the game was nine minutes old.

Jamario Moon, Toronto’s starter at small forward most of the season, returned to the starting lineup after being benched just before the playoffs. And the rookie had a big impact, scoring eight quick points in transition and 11 in the first half.