Ballin': Dwight Howard Scores 45 Points, Takes 23 Rebounds, Sets NBA Free Throw Attempt Record
By Jason McIntyre
Orlando 117, Golden State 109: A career-high 45 points. Twenty-three rebounds. An NBA-record 39 free throw attempts. That’s what Dwight Howard did to the Warriors. It’s too bad Howard could only make 21 of those free throws, otherwise, he could have been looking at a 50-20 night. Biedrins and Lee fouled out trying to contain Howard. Boy, the Warriors sure missed Kwame Brown. That’s the first time that sentence has been written.
Beastly. The Magic are 8-3, but we’ve seen this movie before. They’ll crumble.
Atlanta 111, Charlotte 81: There will be many nights when the Hawks miss Al Horford; this was not one of them. Picking up the slack for their fallen comrade, the Hawks collected 20 offensive rebounds and buried the awful Bobcats (2-9). Josh Smith scored 30 points and had as many offensive boards (4) as the Bobcats.
New York 83, Memphis 94: Pathetic effort for the Knicks, who took awful shots, played no defense, made lazy passes, and lost Carmelo Anthony to injury (ankle) in the 3rd quarter. I guess 3-of-4 of those are to be expected after the “big” win over Philly. Iman Shumpert had a rookie night – he made just 3-of-15 shots … in the first half (he shot 5-of-20 in 28 minutes). When your rookie is taking more shot attempts than Amare and Melo combined (20- 18), there’s a problem. Fix this, D’Antoni. Rudy Gay scored 26 for the Grizzlies.
Milwaukee 102, Detroit 93: The Bucks won their second straight since Andrew Bogut returned to the lineup. Milwaukee is 4-0 at home. Greg Monroe, one of my favorite players in Georgetown history, had his best night as a pro, tallying 32 points and 16 rebounds. The Pistons are 2-9 and have lost six straight. Neat fact: Nobody missed a free throw in this game (41-of-41).
Phoenix 90, Cleveland 101: The return of Michael Redd – 12 points – was overshadowed by another tremendous effort from Cavs’ rookie Kyrie Irving. Besides this bad-ass move, Irving scored a career-high 26 points and outdueled Steve Nash (16 points, 15 assists).