Power Rankings

1. Where We’re At: Heat lead 1-0 after basically running the Celtics out of the gym in the second half of Game 1. It wasn’t pretty. The Celtics looked old and out of sorts, unable to contain LeBron James or Dwyane Wade on the perimeter, and unable to help contest at the rim. If their man defense isn’t there, and their help defense isn’t there, what’s left? The zone? That’s what you’ve got left? The Celtics need to hope that they’ve gotten enough rest to come back and throw a haymaker. They need to put the Heat on the ground, and not the way Rajon Rondo was suggesting. They have to win this game to get back some confidence.

2. The Big Number: 1.12. That’s the number of points per possession the Heat scored on the Celtics’ vaunted defense in Game 1. The Celtics can’t score. At all. Their .089 points per possession in Game 1 tells you that. If they’re going to win they have to turn this thing into a slugfest. They can’t get involved in a shootout. They have no guns. They have to get up close and personal. Maybe most concerning for the Celtics is the fact that Miami really didn’t get out and run in transition very much in Game 1. They needed a slow game, they got it, and the Heat still walloped them.

3. Key Adjustment: Miami went small in Game 1, using a lineup featuring Mario Chalmers, Wade, Shane Battier, and James along with a center for large parts of their run. Boston can’t really respond by going big, but you may see some more lineups with Kevin Garnett and Greg Stiemsma, with K.G. moving back to his usual 4 spot. That means more minutes for Ryan Hollins, though, so there’s a cost. The Heat just matched up too well with small ball for the Celtics to run what they usually do.

4. The Big Story: Rondo said that the Heat have to “hit the deck, too” as a result of Celtics fouls in Game 2. James laughed at Garnett’s act of barking in his ear. This is getting personal, and the Celtics have to send a message they’re still tough. You have to make the Heat tentative to get their offense out of sync. Miami has too much confidence right now. Who gives the hit for Boston? That will be a big question in Game 2.

5. The Facts: 5:30 p.m. PST tipoff. Ray Allen says he will play, despite Doc Rivers’ discussions that he might sit him. Chris Bosh will not play. Mike Miller is a game-time decision with a bruised “everything imaginable.”

Tony Parker had 34 points and eight assists, Manu Ginobili added 20 points and the Spurs stayed perfect in the playoffs with a 120-111 win over the Oklahoma City Thunder in Game 2 of the Western Conference finals Tuesday night.

The Spurs set an NBA record with their 20th consecutive victory bridging the regular season and the playoffs. They came in sharing the longest such streak with the 2000-01 Lakers, who won 19 straight before losing to Philadelphia in the first game of the finals.

Those Lakers went on to win the championship and Parker’s performance is yet another reason to think the Spurs will do the same.

Guided by their All-Star point guard, San Antonio shredded Oklahoma City’s defense with pinpoint passes for three quarters. The Spurs were shooting 63 percent from the field and 64 percent from 3-point range at one point in the third quarter and stretched the lead to 22 points in the second half.

Parker went 16 for 21 from the field, including a 3-pointer.

”Tony’s been great all year,” Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said. ”He’s been really focused the entire season.”

Johnie Kirton, a fullback with the San Jose SaberCats of the Arena Football League, has died in Northern California, the team announced Tuesday. He was 26.

The San Jose (Calif.) Mercury News reported Kirton was found dead in a Santa Clara hotel room.

A cause of death was not released, but the Mercury News reported that Santa Clara police said there was no indication any crime had occurred in connection with the case. “We’re just stunned,” Mark Grieb, the SaberCats’ quarterback, told the Mercury News on Tuesday. “One minute you’re playing with a guy and then the next you hear that this has happened.”

Grieb told the Mercury News a teammate discovered Kirton’s body after receiving a call from Kirton’s girlfriend. She was concerned about Kirton and asked the teammate to look in on him.

SaberCats owner and head coach Darren Arbet called Kirton, who scored the game-winning touchdown on Saturday for San Jose against Chicago, a “great team guy and hard-nosed player.” Kirton also played for the Chicago Rush and the Arizona Rattlers during three seasons in the AFL. He played in college at the University of Washington and was a team captain in 2008.

Rattlers coach Kevin Guy told the Arizona Republic that Kirton’s 2-year-old daughter and grandparents live in the Phoenix area.

Thunder @ Spurs 6pm TNT

Gregg Popovich’s “I want some nasty!” is fast becoming the catchphrase of the NBA playoffs. It’s eminently quotable, brash and an overnight splash.

In other words, it’s everything the San Antonio Spurs are not.

They’ve also heard far worse in timeouts from the NBA Coach of the Year, who bellowed his now-famous and fuming marching orders that jumpstarted a fourth-quarter rally, extended a history-matching winning streak to 19 and left the Oklahoma City Thunder stunned heading into Game 2 of the Western Conference finals Tuesday night.

“You’ve got to watch Pop – he’s good at turning that microphone on and off,” Spurs forward Stephen Jackson said Monday. “You don’t hear some of the stuff he says.”

All the Thunder mostly heard Monday were questions about their costly collapse down the stretch.

Oklahoma City started the fourth quarter leading – a rare feat against the Spurs in the past 47 days, which is how long it’s been since their last loss. Going up 2-0 would put the Spurs among just three others teams in NBA history with winning streaks of 20 games or longer.

It would also break the record for longest winning streak extended in the playoffs, a mark the Spurs now share with the 2001 Lakers.

“We really don’t care,” guard Manu Ginobili said. “We are close – seven games – from accomplishing something way better than a streak. (The streak) is happening, it’s fine. But we always think about next time and how tough it’s going to be.”

LeBron James scored 32 points and grabbed 13 rebounds, Wade scored 10 of his 22 points in the fourth quarter and the Heat beat the Boston Celtics 93-79 on Monday night in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals.

”One down. And they still have an opportunity in Game 2 to accomplish what they want to,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said, referring to how Boston can still grab home-court advantage by winning Game 2. ”At times it was a strange game. Some good runs, both teams. We felt we could have played better and I’m sure they felt the same thing. But we found a way to grind it.”

Shane Battier, playing in the conference finals for the first time, had 10 points and 10 rebounds for the Heat, who wasted an early 11-point first-half lead, then gave up 35 second-quarter points before running away to break a halftime tie – getting going with a 9-2 run early in the third.

Miami outrebounded the Celtics 48-33, blocked 11 shots and didn’t trail at any time.

”A block is like a dunk,” Wade said. ”It gets your team going

Police say boxer Paul Williams was driving his modified sport motorcycle too fast for conditions when he crashed into an embankment.His manager, George Peterson, said the boxer was paralyzed and has no movement from the waist down after Sunday’s crash in Marietta, northwest of Atlanta.

Peterson said the 30-year-old athlete severed his spinal cord after falling on his back and head when he was thrown from his motorcycle.

Marietta police said in a statement Tuesday morning that Williams was driving at a high rate of speed which was too fast for conditions. Police say he could not negotiate a curve, and the bike slammed into the embankment.

Peterson said Williams was scheduled to fight Saul ”Canelo” Alvarez on Sept. 15 in Las Vegas but that event has been canceled.

Dwyane Wade and LeBron James turned around a season on the brink with perhaps the most remarkable week of their high-powered partnership, capped off by a 105-93 victory in Game 6 Thursday night that sent the Heat back to the Eastern Conference finals.

Wade scored 41 points, James had 28 and Miami wrapped up the series 4-2, advancing to face either Boston or Philadelphia.

But this was about more than one game.

This was a dazzling trilogy, Wade and James taking control when the Heat were down and looked like they might be out.

”In the regular season, we’ve had some good games,” Wade said. ”But I don’t know if we’ve ever had three in a row like that in the playoffs.”

Seven days earlier, Miami trailed 2-1 in the series after getting routed 94-75 in Indianapolis. The fired-up Pacers had another game on their home court and a chance to build a commanding lead.

Instead, the Big Three-Turned-Two took over.

With Chris Bosh sidelined by an abdominal injury, James and Wade soared to new heights in their two-man game. Over the course of three dazzling games, James scored 98 points, grabbed 34 rebounds and dished out 24 assists. Wade had 99 points, 22 rebounds and 11 assists.

”Ever since Game 3, they’ve played at such a high level,” Indiana coach Frank Vogel said. ”I don’t know if anybody can beat them.”

LeBron James was the leading vote-getter for the All-NBA team, while Kobe Bryant earned his 10th first-team selection, tied for second on the career list.Bryant, a first-team pick for the seventh straight season, joined Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Elgin Baylor, Bob Cousy, Michael Jordan, Bob Pettit, and Jerry West with 10 selections to the first team. Karl Malone is the leader with 11.

James, who won his third MVP award, received 118 of a possible 120 first-team votes Thursday from a panel of writers and broadcasters. Joining him on the first team were scoring champion Kevin Durant, Clippers point guard Chris Paul and Magic center Dwight Howard.

Guards Tony Parker and Russell Westbrook were selected to the second team, along with forwards Kevin Love and Blake Griffin and center Andrew Bynum.

The gem Dan Haren tossed Thursday night looked awfully familiar to Albert Pujols. Except this time instead of Pujols getting fooled by what Haren was tossing, he was helping the Los Angeles Angels’ right-hander put together one of the finest efforts of his career.”He makes good hitters look pretty bad including myself, he has in the past,” Pujols said. ”He is pretty amazing when he keeps the ball down.

Pujols had three hits, including his 450th career home run, and Haren struck out a career-high 14 to lead the Los Angeles Angels to a 3-0 win over the Seattle Mariners on Thursday night.

The Angels and Mariners met for the first of 19 games this season and Pujols, a newcomer to the AL West rivalry, made his presence known immediately. He lined a two-run shot off Seattle starter Jason Vargas (5-4) with one-out in the top of the first, and added line-drive singles in the fourth and sixth innings. It was just his third three-hit game this season.