|
GREENSBORO, N. Nike Air Max 90 Dam Rea .C. -- Rod Hall stormed down the court, determined to send No. 7 Duke to another one-and-done at the ACC tournament. And then Tyler Thornton reached out and came up with the only defensive stop the Blue Devils needed. Duke held on to beat Clemson 63-62 Friday night in the ACC quarterfinals after Rodney Hood hit two free throws with 3.8 seconds left and Thornton came up with his timely stop -- the only one the Blue Devils managed in the last 5 minutes. "We wouldve lost that game a month ago, I think," Hood said. ACC rookie of the year Jabari Parker scored 18 points, and Hood had 17 for the third-seeded Blue Devils (25-7). They blew a 13-point lead with 12 minutes left before regrouping just in time to avoid joining No. 15 North Carolina and No. 11 Syracuse as ACC quarterfinal losers. Duke will play seventh-seeded North Carolina State in a semifinal Saturday. Hall scored 13 points to lead sixth-seeded Clemson (20-12), and his runner in the lane with 7.4 seconds left capped a late 15-5 run and gave the Tigers their only lead of the second half at 62-61. After Hoods free throws, Hall made it deep into the lane before Thornton stripped him a moment before the buzzer sounded. "He was coming so fast, and I was just trying not to hit him on the body," Thornton said. "And then I saw an opportunity to swipe at the ball when he went through, and I hit it." Clemson coach Brad Brownell and the rest of the Tigers staff erupted when no foul was called. Hall said he was hit "on both sides" by two defenders. "I mean, we wasnt getting calls throughout the game," Hall said. "So I didnt know how it was going to go out. Just trying to make a play." Rasheed Sulaimon added 14 points and Amile Jefferson had 13 rebounds for the Blue Devils, who narrowly avoided their third straight post-season loss at the Greensboro Coliseum. They lost their first ACC tournament game here last year to Maryland and before that were memorably upset by 15th-seeded Lehigh in their NCAA tournament opener in 2012. All-ACC guard K.J. McDaniels scored 12 points and Jordan Roper added 11 for Clemson, which trailed by nine points with less than 6 minutes remaining before its late run. "In the beginning of the second half, we kind of got a lot of stuff at the rim, and I think we shied away from that," Parker said. "We didnt really get to the line like we wanted to, and we allowed them to take advantage of our bad shots, and they would capitalize on offence when they got on the breaks because they took advantage of the bad shots we took." Damarcus Harrison and Hall hit back-to-back 3s to start the burst in which the Tigers scored on seven straight possessions. McDaniels hit a free throw with 47.7 seconds left to pull Clemson to 61-60. When Sulaimon missed a floater with about 15 seconds left, Landry Nnoko pulled down the rebound and kicked it out to Hall -- who hurried downcourt and hit his runner in the lane to briefly put the Tigers ahead. Hood then flew right back the other way, drew contact from McDaniels while attacking the basket and hit both ends of a one-and-one for the games final points. "I just got eye contact with him when he got the ball, and I said, Go," coach Mike Krzyzewski said. "I believe in Rodney. You sink or swim with him, and were still swimming. So thank goodness." Nnoko finished with 10 points for Clemson, which won the only regular-season meeting -- a 72-59 romp in January that dropped Duke to 1-2 in the league and caused a significant amount of soul-searching among the Blue Devils. The Tigers shot 67 per cent in the second half of this one to nearly knock them off again. "I couldnt be prouder of my players to show the resiliency we did throughout the game, especially the second half when it looked like we were dead again," Brownell said. "Our guys just had a lot of fight. They just kept coming." Nike Air Max Thea Herr . A few changes have been made this year, as RDS will no longer be producing it. Instead, the Canadiens have hired their own team of creative masterminds to produce the reality series. Adidas Originals ZX Flux . Anthony Davis and the New Orleans Pelicans ended up with the bigger problem. LOS ANGELES -- Mr. Game 7 delivered in Game 1 of the Stanley Cup final. Justin Williams scored 4:36 into overtime as the Los Angeles Kings rallied to edge the New York Rangers 3-2 in the opening game of the NHL championship series Wednesday night. The winning goal came on a cruel bounce, a sudden end to an evening that had started with so much promise for the underdog Rangers. Dan Girardi fanned on a clearing attempt and the puck ended up at the blue-line with Mike Richards, who found Williams alone in front. Williams, who is 7-0 on the Game 7 stage with seven goals and 14 points, scored high to the stick side to complete a Kings comeback from 2-0 down. It was his first career playoff overtime goal. "Ive said this many times, Justin is the most underrated player on our team by a mile," said Kings defenceman Drew Doughty, who had a roller-coaster night. "He doesnt get enough credit for what he does. "Theres two guys on this team that I want to give the puck to and thats him and Kopie (Anze Kopitar). When they have the puck, plays happen." Added coach Darryl Sutter: "Our best right-winger every night consistently." Williams eighth goal of the playoffs marked the third straight year that Game 1 of the final has gone to OT. Game 2 goes Saturday at the Staples Center with advantage Los Angeles. Teams winning Game 1 have gone on to claim the Cup 77 per cent of the time (57-of-74 series) since the final went to a best-of-seven format in 1939. Benoit Pouliot and Carl Hagelin scored for the Rangers before a crowd of 18,399, the Kings 118th straight sellout. Kyle Clifford and Doughty also scored for Los Angeles, which trailed 2-0 after 15 minutes. "Its a great result for us definitely but we have a lot of things to clean up," said Williams, who has nine points (three goals, six assists) in the last seven games. "Certainly not our best game by any standards especially ours. But we were able to get it done and thats the most important thing." "Weve got a lot to clean up but (we are) happy with the win," said Doughty. After going down early, the Kings tied it up at 2-2 in the second period and then came on like a freight train --outshooting New York 20-3 in the final period. The Rangers held on and then threatened late in a wild ending to regulation time. "I liked the way we played in the first two periods," said Rangers coach Alain Vigneault. "I thought it was a hard-fought first 40 minutes by both teams. "Not quite sure what happened there in the third." New York goalie Henrik Lundqvist and the Kings Jonathan Quick both lived up to their reputations on the night, with Quick busy early and Lundqvist late in an entertaining end-to-end game. "He was the reason why we went to overtime," Vigneault said of Lundqvist. "I mean, he gave us a chance. When you get to overtime, a lot of times its a bounce, its a shot. Tonight they got it." "Our best player tonight," Sutter said of Quick. The Rangers managed 25 shots in regulation time. The shots were 2-2 in OT. "Quick didnt have many saves in the third period, but he had some Grade-A ones," said Williams. The Kings registered 13 straight shots in the third before the Rangers finally forced Quick into action 11 minutes 58 seconds into the period. The Kings werent good early on. New York, which had been off since disposing of Montreal last Thursday, came out buzzing. The speedy Rangers played with a purpose after the puck dropped. It was like little brother taking it to big brother -- they scored some knockdowns but eventually the bigger Kings began to claw back control. The Kings, who edged the Blackhawks in overtime Sunday in Chicago to win the Western Conference crown, finished with 455 hits to the Rangers 33. Nike Air Max Thea Dam. "They come at you hard," said Vigneault. "When you make a play, you got to be willing to take the hit to make the play. Thats something we knew coming into the series. "I thought for 40 minutes we handled it real well. Not quite sure what happened in the third there." New York -- the best road team in the East this season with 25 wins -- had two good scoring chances in the first three minutes. Quick had to poke-check Chris Kreider to end one threat and then stopped Hagelin from in front after a giveaway. It was an entertaining start, albeit a sloppy one. Quick was a busy man as the Rangers probed for an opening. New York went ahead at 13:21 when Doughty tried to be cute at the New York blue-line, attempting to drag the puck past an onrushing Ranger and lost possession. Things went from bad to worse when defence partner Jake Muzzin fell down and Pouliot scored to the stick side on the ensuing breakaway. The Rangers made it 2-0 the penalty kill at 15:03 as the Roadrunner-like Hagelin outraced Slava Voynov and headed to goal. Quick made the save but the puck bounced in off Voynovs skate for Hagelins seventh of the playoffs. While the bounce was unfortunate, it was the Rangers second scoring chance on the penalty. Hagelin, who also scored on the penalty kill against Montreal, is the sixth player in Rangers history to record more than one short-handed goal in one playoff year and the first since Mark Messier scored two in 1992. Los Angeles pulled one back at 17:33 on a good forecheck. Derek Stepan failed to clear the puck, turning it over and the Kings crashed the net, with Clifford jamming it in top shelf to revive the Staples Center crowd. It was Cliffords first post-season goal since April 23, 2011, snapping a 37-game playoff drought. The Kings outshot the Rangers 14-13 in a first period that belonged to the visitors. Doughty made up for his earlier turnover with a sweet goal that featured almost the same move that tripped him up before. Taking a nifty Williams backhand pass, a trailing Doughty toe-dragged the puck between his legs to evade Derek Dorsett and then snapped a shot through Lundqvists legs for his fifth of the playoffs at 6:36. While Doughty put on the brakes to score from in close, two Rangers and two Kings jostled on the other side of Lundqvist. It was Doughtys 17th point of the post-season, breaking the club record for a defenceman he set two years ago. Clifford made a fine pass to trigger the attack. On the bench, rugged Kings defenceman Matt Greene got treatment for a nasty gash by his left eye that looked like someone had taken a box-cutter to him. The game was getting nasty with Doughty complaining bitterly he had been butt-ended. Later in the game, he got a penalty for embellishment. The shots were 22-21 for the Rangers after 40 minutes. Both teams have travelled marathon journeys to get here. The Kings played 21 games, a league-record maximum, while the Rangers saw action in 20. The record for most playoff games in a single season is 26, set by the 1987 Philadelphia Flyers and 2004 Calgary Flames. The most by a Cup winner is 25, by the 2006 Carolina Hurricanes and 2011 Boston Bruins. Los Angeles finished 10th overall in the league during the regular season with 100 points, four ahead of No. 12 New York. The Kings are looking to win their second Cup in three seasons while the Rangers are after their first championship in 20 years. It was the Kings first playoff OT win at home since May 6, 2001, against Colorado. NOTES: Celebs at the game included Will Ferrell, Kate Bosworth, Jon Hamm, Ellen Page, Jim Carrey, Matthew Perry, Steve Carell, David Boreanaz, Kevin Connolly, Larry David, Catherine Keener, Spike Jonze, and Flea and Chad Smith of the Red Hot Chili Peppers. cheap nfl jerseyscheap jerseys ' ' ' |
