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Paul Pierce and Kobe Bryant took center stage last night, scoring 36 and 38 points respectively while carrying their teams to victory. Pierce also did something decidedly less-awesome during the game, but we'll get to that later. First, some Wizards links:
- John Wall plans to spend a lot of time watching Tony Parker and Chris Paul in the playoffs and studying how each point guard varies their speeds in order to keep defenses off-balance. Not a bad duo to emulate. [Washington Post]
- Carla Peay offers her five-step offseason plan to improving the Wizards. [Washington Times]
- Here's a nice look at some statistics that sort of sum up the Wizards season. I still can't get over John Wall's .071 three-point percentage. It's so bad, it makes his rookie percentage of .296 look prolific. You could probably have all 50 fans at a Wizards game line up and shoot threes and get half of them to shoot better than Wall did this season. Just mind-bogglingly bad for an NBA guard. [Wiz of Awes]
- For those who have already forgotten why the Wiz traded away JaVale McGee, TAI has put together "Can't Say I Do: The Movie," a mini-documentary that encapsulates Pierre's most noteworthy contributions to the franchise and features a lot of Steve Buckhantz sounding very sad. Sheer brilliance. [Truth About It]
- #QUOTESANITY update!!! With the polls closed, "Can't Say I Do" trounced "Big Kahunas" 74 percent to 25 percent. As of 9 a.m., with an hour left to vote, "1 Percent Full" has a dominating 67-to-32-percent lead over "KILLMODE SQAURED!!!" Meanwhile, with 354 ballots case, "Apparently Not" has 85 percent of the vote and is gonna storm to victory over "Erudite JaVale" and its 14 percent. And with 75 percent of the 356 votes tallied, "Future of the NBA" appears the victor over "Media Friendzy" and its 24 percent.
- CSN Washington's season-in-review series of player profiles continues with a look at Jordan Crawford.
- Video of Crawford's final media interview before departing for the offseason. [NBA.com]
- Some parting thoughts from Wizards players as they left Verizon Center following exit interviews with Randy Wittman and Ernie Grunfeld. [Washington Times]
- Another story about Nick Young and his awesome performance for one minute in one game (enough already!), though there is a cute little anecdote about how Young's agent first told his mother about the trade that sent him back home to L.A. [The Commercial Appeal]
- It appears Josh Smith might become the latest star to miss playoff action due to injury. More on that, plus quick recaps of yesterday's games here. [ESPN Daily Dime]
- Speaking of Smith, look! He pulled a JaVale!! [SB Nation]
- But yeah, the injuries really are beginning to stack up. Jeffrey Tomik has a brief recap of the five most significant thus far this postseason. [Washington Examiner]
- Because Paul Pierce hates all of us, he decided to remind everyone that Tim Tebow exists during his team's Game 2 victory over the Hawks. [SB Nation]
- Ball Don't Lie offers Pierce an exhaustive list of things he can do next time that are better than Tebowing (and one thing that Tebowing is still better than).
- Tebowing aside, Pierce was awesome yesterday. With Rajon Rondo serving a one-game suspension for chest-bumping an official in Game 1, Pierce scored 36 points and grabbed 14 rebounds while carrying the Celtics to an 87-80 victory over the Hawks, pulling the series even at 1-1. [Yahoo! Sports]
- Kobe Bryant feels healthy. No kidding. The guy scored 38 points yesterday to lead the Lakers past the Nuggets for a 104-100 win and a 2-0 series lead. [Yahoo! Sports]
- More on Kobe taking back the postseason spotlight. [ESPN]
- The Bulls' first game after Derrick Rose's ACL tear, a 109-92 loss to the Sixers, did not inspire confidence moving forward. [ESPN Chicago]
- A lot of people took their turn calling Amar'e Stoudemire a moron for punching some glass after the Knicks dropped Game 2 against the Heat. Even the New York tabloids had their fun. Imagine that. [SB Nation]
- Andrew Sharp on why the Knicks might be better off without Stoudemire and his fire extinguisher-assaulting ways. [SB Nation]
- Those with weak stomachs should avoid this report on the severity of Stoudemire's hand injury. Gross. [ESPN New York]
- Betcha never thought David Herman beating a malfunctioning printer with his bare hands in Office Space could get any better. Well, it just did. Oh Internet, you really are amazing sometimes. [SB Nation]
- Wait, did I just say the Internet is amazing? I meant really, really strange... [SB Nation]
- The Thunder are up 2-0 against the Mavericks in what has been the best first-round series thus far. So the obvious question is, are Kevin Durant & Co. in trouble? [SB Nation]
- Spurs coach Gregg Popovich has won NBA Coach of the Year while Knicks center Tyson Chandler has won NBA Defensive Player of the Year. No surprises there.
- The Brooklyn Nets debuted their new black-and-white logos Monday, and I kind of like them. Very clean, very retro. What do you think? [ESPN New York]