"We're happy, but we're not popping any champagne bottles. We're not looking at this as a fairytale or something. We're going to try to keep it going."
---Chris Paul, Hornets point guard
Chris Paul scored the fifth triple of his career and his second this season, but the Hornets used a collective effort to eliminate the Dallas Mavericks 99-94 from the best-of-7 series and advance into the semifinals of the Western Conference on Tuesday night before 18,260 at the Arena.
The Hornets will host the defending NBA champions San Antonio Spurs on Saturday in the Arena after the Spurs defeated the Phoenix Suns 92-87 late Tuesday night.
Paul scored 25 points, 15 assists and 11 rebounds in a two-way battle with KoME Bryant of the Lakers for the MVP award. NFL insiders have Bryant winning, but Hornets fans aren't going to buy that.
Hornets coach Byron Scott received his NBA Coach of the Year Award before the game and he talked about his team's collective effort being the key to the Hornets' success.
"It was a total team effort and it's been that way all season," Hornets forward David West told the media after the game. "Everybody was prepared to do what they had to do. We came into this post-season expecting to win. A lot of people may be suprised at how this thing turned out, but we're not too surprised." West had a game-high 25 points.
"This win (which eliminated Dallas 1-4) says a lot about the maturity level and confidence of this team," said Scott."We still feel like we can be a better team. Entering the playoffs, we hadn't been playing that well, but we played extremely well in four of those five games."
There had been reports that friction between the Mavs' Jason Kidd and Scott led to Scott's departure from New Jersey. Both prefer to avoid the subject, but Kidd did have some nice things to say about his former coach when Scott received the Red Auerbach trophy as coach of the year.
"I think that's great," said Kidd. "He deserves it. He probably should have gotten it when he was in New Jersey. I'm happy for him and his team. They fought all year."
Mavs coach Avery Johnson, who will probably lose his job after this season, wished he had a point guard like Paul.
"Congratulations to a young Nate Archbald," said Johnson. "He's a special player. He's relentless, he's strong, he's intelligent. He and his coach have great chemistry."
Mavs star Dirk Nowitzki gave it all he had but couldn’t get enough help.
"I don't want to take anything away from New Orleans," said Dirk. "I think they're a phenomenal team. I think what really lost it for us was Game 1. They had some jitters in the first half. We should have taken advantage of that more and come out somehow with the win.
"And we can't lose Game 4 at home. no matter what happens. To me, that Game 4 was a killer."
Tuesday's victory was the Hornets' 15th in their past 16 games in the Arena. They had a paid attendance of 18,260 Tuesday marking the club's ninth straight home sellout.
Tickets for Games 1 and 2 of the playoff series with the Spurs will be available via presale to season ticket holders and Bee-Mail subscribers beginning on Thursday.
Hornets fans are enjoying this series victory over Dallas and they know they'll be seeing a much better team in the Spurs when they try to continue their team's fairytale trip.
But before they tear up their up their tickets, they will point out that their coach has one of the better postseason winning percentages of the coaches in these playoffs.
Ventura vs. Jindal, a match made in heaven. Vegas would establish Ventura as a 10-1 favorite to generate action. It would be difficult to get such a match approved by the athletic commission because of the difference in weights. But miracles happen everyday. Written by Coach, Metairie, 4/30/08
on 4/30/2008
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BIG SPORTING EVENT!!!!!!!!! Jesse Ventura against Piyush 'Bobby' Jindal in a 'no holds barred' cage wrestling event!!!!!!!! Now this is something I could see Nagin having a reason to get 'excited' about,,,, and think of the tourists dollars New Orleans could generate!!!!!!!! TWO MEN ENTER, ONE MAN LEAVES.......... Written by Let the games for the power of Thunder Dome begin!
on 4/30/2008
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