Hornets Buzzing & Pistons Move Forward!

On Tuesday night the New Orleans Hornets gained payback as they beat the Spurs soundly, 101-79. New Orleans buzzed out after halftime with the Spurs leading, and Chris Paul took over the game. Paul finished with 22 points and 14 assists to lead his team to victory. Forward David West had an impressive 38 points and 14 rebounds in the win, as well as 5 blocks. Perhaps the most impressive of his 2 points came on a layup where he drove by Duncan under the basket and then hit the layup. The Hornets have now outscored San Antonio by a total of 93 points in their 3 wins, while San Antonio has outscored New Orleans by a combined 41 in their two wins.

Despite the victory, the Hornets saw their defensive-minded Center Tyson Chandler leave the game in the 4th with an apparent ankle injury. Chandler was in obvious pain and was helped the bench by his teammates. There was also a brief verbal altercation between referee Joey Crawford and Spurs coach Greg Popovich.

During Popovich's post game press conference one reporter asked why all the contests have been blowouts and Pop replied he had no idea, but if he did he'd prevent them. Popovich also gave credit to great defense from New Orleans during the game. Game 6 on Thursday could see the Hornets move on to the Western Conference Finals to await Utah or Los Angeles.

Also on Tuesday night, the Detroit Pistons, minus their star point guard Chauncey Billups, managed to beat the Magic and move on to the next round. In Game 5 it was Detroit's masked man, Rip Hamilton who scored 31 points in all to lead the way. Tayshaun Prince added a key block on Turkoglu down the stretch while poor FT shooting hampered Orlando who still played Detroit tough this series. When all was said and done Tuesday night, it was an 81-86 Pistons win. Hamilton not only helped his team to the Eastern Conference Finals, but he also broke Isiah Thomas' career playoff scoring record. Isiah's record of 2,261 points was set in 111 games, while Rip broke the record in 110 games. Congrats to Rip and the Pistons who have now reached six straight Eastern Finals!

Wednesday night sees the Cavs and Celtics resume at 8PM wit the Jazz and Lakers also resuming Game 5 at 10:30 PM. Both games will be shown on TNT.