Tag: game 1

Saturday’s alright for winning as LSU tops Southern in second weekend game.

The Tigers took the second leg of their four-game weekend slate with a 9-2 win over the Jaguars.

The Tigers won their second game of the weekend on Saturday, but things didn’t start off very positive in what was ultimately a 9-2 win over the Southern Jaguars.

Ma’Khail Hilliard got the start on the mound for LSU who allowed two earned runs in four innings of work. Tre Morgan led the Tigers at the plate going 4 for 5 with three RBI followed by Merrifield and Thompson who both finished 2 for 3

In the top of the fourth inning, the Jaguars drew first blood with an RBI triple which was followed up by an RBI single against Tigers starter Hilliard. Gavin Dugas then made a diving grab in the outfield to stop the bleeding at 2-0 Southern.

Hilliard was replaced by Coleman to start the top of the fifth. In the bottom of the fifth, the Tigers finally got on the board as Dylan Crews hit an infield single that brought Milazzo home from third. After recording four outs in 1 1/3 innings, Coleman exited the game with an injury and was replaced by Gervase who came in and struck out the final two batters of the inning with ease.

After a pair of singles in the bottom of the sixth inning by Jobert and Thompson, Gavin Dugas hit a two-RBI double into the gap in right-center field and the Tigers took their first lead of the ballgame at 3-2. After Millazo bunted Dugas over to third, Whit Merrifield brought him home on an RBI double down the third-base line to make it 4-2 LSU.

Tre Morgan then continued his great day with an RBI single to score Merrifield. Tre Morgan scored on a sac fly to left by Jacob Berry and after six full innings, LSU led 6-2. In the bottom of the seventh inning, Milazzo laid down a sacrifice bunt to bring home Thompson. Tre Morgan picked up his fourth hit of the day with a two-RBI single to make it 9-2 Tigers after seven innings.

Trent Vietmeyer came in at the top of the eighth inning as a relief pitcher and finished off the win.

LSU will play a doubleheader tomorrow with the first game against Towson at 11 a.m. CST before another matchup against the Jaguars at 5 p.m.

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LeBron James reacts to Chris Paul, Suns winning Game 1 of NBA Finals

LeBron James reacted to Chris Paul winning his first NBA Finals game.

The first game of the 2021 NBA Finals is in the books, and the Phoenix Suns have grabbed the lead.

The Suns, with home-court advantage, defeated the Milwaukee Bucks, 118-105, and possess the momentum entering Game 2.

Phoenix grew the lead to double-digits in the third quarter when Chris Paul took over, and once Paul seized control of the game, the Suns didn’t look back.

Paul dropped 32 points, nine assists, four rebounds and a steal in 37 minutes while shooting 12-of-19 overall, 4-of-7 from 3-point range and 4-of-4 from the free-throw stripe.

This series is the first time Paul is playing in the NBA Finals during his lengthy career.

With Phoenix and Paul three wins away from winning their first titles each, Los Angeles Lakers star LeBron James reacted to the moment on Twitter:

Paul and the Suns were the team that eliminated the Lakers in the first round this season — preventing L.A. from repeating as champions — but the friendship between James and Paul dates back a long time.

Game 2 is on Thursday, July 8 at 9:00 p.m. EST.

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3 takeaways: Lakers can’t contain Devin Booker as Suns win Game 1

Devin Booker scored a game-high 34 points as the Los Angeles Lakers went cold from the field, dropping the first game of the series.

In a heated opening match that saw tensions spill over in the fourth quarter, the Los Angeles Lakers dropped Game 1 against the Phoenix Suns, 99-90.

With home-court advantage as the second seed, the Suns’ crowd brought the energy that hasn’t been felt since before the coronavirus pandemic. Phoenix seemed to use that energy to boost their play, as they forced the Lakers into tough looks right out of the gate while scoring efficiently on the other end.

Devin Booker, primarily, gave the Lakers fits all game long, leading all scorers with 34 points. Even when Chris Paul went down with a shoulder injury, Booker carried the burden with poise.

Los Angeles, on the other hand, looked lethargic for much of the game. Their play was reminiscent of the first half against the Golden State Warriors in the play-in tournament, but this time, their fortune didn’t change.

Here are three takeaways from the Lakers’ loss:

Gators dominated by No. 1 Arkansas’ pitching in Game 1

Florida only managed three hits in a 6-1 loss to the No. 1 Razorbacks in Game 1, and now it will have to salvage the series on Friday.

Facing the No. 1 team in the nation on the road this weekend, Florida knew coming into the series against Arkansas that it had its work cut out for it. But the Gators’ performance in Game 1 was far from ideal.

Their lineup couldn’t crack the code against the Razorbacks’ top-two pitchers, and though UF’s pitching held up for much of the game (until a three-run homer in the eighth), it wasn’t enough to keep the game in range, allowing nine hits in total. No. 9 Florida dropped the series opener 6-1 and will have to fight out of a hole on Friday and Saturday to take the series.

Patrick Wicklander took the mound to start for UA (40-10, 20-8 SEC), and he had one of his best performances in an Arkansas uniform, striking out a career-high 11 batters. He allowed just three hits in six innings, and he led off the game by retiring the side in order.

Wicklander made one of his few mistakes in the second inning. With one out, he gave up a solo homer to Kendrick Calilao on a 1-0 pitch as Florida (35-17, 17-11 SEC) took an early lead. Tommy Mace, who started for the Gators, allowed a hit in the first inning but he worked through the second cleanly.

Arkansas tested him in the third with an effort that started with a leadoff double. Mace forced two outs, but after that, a pair of walks loaded up the bases. A flyball that was easily fielded ended the threat, but it signaled what was to come.

Mace hit a batter to start the fourth, but he seemed to recover well with back-to-back strikeouts. But he couldn’t escape the inning, allowing an RBI single to Casey Opitz that tied the game at one run. A subsequent double put two runners in scoring position, but a strikeout looking from Mace ended the inning.

He continued to run into trouble after that, though. He gave up a solo home run to Cayden Wallace, and though that wasn’t enough to end his night, the two walks he gave up following it were. It wasn’t the best outing for Mace, who went just 4 2/3, allowing five hits and three runs (though he did manage eight strikeouts).

Trey Van Der Weide entered, and he immediately gave up a single to load the bases. Opitz cracked a single, notching another RBI, and Arkansas took a 3-1 lead. Wicklander, meanwhile, hadn’t given up a hit since the fourth inning, and he worked through the sixth inning cleanly, though Van Der Weide managed to do the same after a rough start in the fifth.

Wicklander’s night finally came to an end, but the news for Florida still wasn’t good. Kevin Kopps, the nation’s ERA leader at 0.80, entered, and he shut down the Gators entirely. He pitched three innings, allowing no hits, and he struck out five Florida batters.

Christian Scott, who entered for UF in the middle of the seventh, tried to keep the team in range but struggled in the eighth. After starting off with two outs, he gave up a ground-rule double and chose to intentionally walk UA’s Matt Goodheart.

The Razorbacks made him pay for that, as Wallace crushed his second homer of the game, this time scoring three runs, and Arkansas stretched its lead to five runs for good measure. Heading into the ninth, Florida didn’t have much hope. But whatever remained was extinguished by Kopps, who put UF’s lineup away in order with just nine pitches.

With the Game 1 loss, Florida will try to even up the series in Game 2 on Saturday, which is set to start at 8 p.m. EDT.

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Game 1 Pregame Hype: Florida Gators vs Ole Miss Rebels

Let us take a look at some of the hype that is happening on social media as the Florida Gators gear up to face the Ole Miss Rebels.

We are just a couple of hours away from kickoff as the Florida Gators (No. 6 in Coaches Poll, No. 5 in AP Poll) get set to take on the Ole Miss Rebels (unranked) in Oxford, Miss., in the first of the 10-game, Southeastern Conference-only football schedule this fall.

Game time is scheduled for 12 p.m. EDT and is one of a pair of league games starting at high noon, along with the Kentucky Wildcats (unranked in Coaches Poll, No. 23 in AP Poll) at the Auburn Tigers (No. 8 in Coaches Poll and AP Poll). The rest of the SEC plays later in the day, with all 14 teams seeing opening week action.

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Let us take a look at some of the hype that is happening on social media as we quickly approach kick off, from the university itself to the fans and alumni around the Gator Nation this Saturday as SEC football finally returns to our lives.

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Stevens: Celtics need to be ‘better in transition,’ play less ISOball

The Boston Celtics took their foot off the gas up 14 in the fourth quarter of Game 1 against the Miami Heat in the East Finals, and it cost them dearly.

The Boston Celtics had the Miami Heat right where they wanted them in Game 1 of their Eastern Conference Finals series.

Until they didn’t.

Up 14 points early in the game’s fourth quarter, the Celtics took their foot off the gas, playing sloppy defense and ISOball that allowed the Heat to claw their way back into the game, forcing overtime and the eventual 117 – 114 loss.

After the game, head coach Brad Stevens was asked what it was about Miami that enabled them to keep star point guard Kemba Walker cold and Boston off-balance late in the game more generally.

“Some of the guards were able to keep in front with their lengths, and then Bam [Adebayo] was switching a ton of pick and rolls all day,” explained Stevens.

“Bam’s a tremendous defender, so we’re going to have to figure out, again, better ways to attack, especially late,” he added. “I thought we really moved it at times, and then we did get stuck.”

“The fouls killed us, and then the transition, with our transition defense. In addition to playing slower and pounding the ball more so we just got to be a lot better in all those areas. These games go back and forth like this. We were down six I think and then took that lead. We got to play better though, and transition defense really stands out. That Hierro 3 with a minute left and regulation was a killer.”

“But there were multiple other plays that led up to that, that I thought let them back in.”

Stevens stood by his immediate assessment the next day as well.

“What I said yesterday stood out more than anything was a transition defense, [which] was just really bad. To their credit, they attacked us all night down the floor, and … some of those plays in the fourth, where we gave up layups and or got lost on some 3s hurt us. So we’ve just got to clean that up, we’ve got to be a lot better in transition. I think we got to be a lot better on some of their actions, though we guarded other actions well. And then we need to know what to react [to]. We need to know what not to overreact to from an action standpoint.”

“So, those are things that we talked about on the defensive end, we’ll look to play better,” he added.

And play better they will need to do for a full 48 minutes to avoid falling into a 0-2 hole to start the series.

Trailing for the first time this postseason, Boston has learned a painful lesson about the margin for error against this highly-motivated Heat squad.

It’s small enough to be virtually nonexistent, meaning bad habits must be expunged as soon as they re-emerge, and every player will be called on to play like their best selves for every second of game time they can muster.

Perfection won’t be needed from Boston to advance in this series, but something not far from to it will be, if what we saw on Tuesday was any sign of what’s to come.

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WATCH: Boston Celtics – Miami Heat Game 1 East Finals highlights

Watch this video to see all of the Boston Celtics highlights from their Game 1 loss to the Miami Heat in the 2020 East Finals Tuesday evening.

The Boston Celtics dropped a close one to the Miami Heat in overtime, falling 117 – 114 despite holding a 14-point lead early in the game’s fourth quarter.

Jayson Tatum led all players with 30 points, 14 rebounds, 5 assists, 3 steals and 2 blocks, and Marcus Smart added 26 points on 9-of-18 shooting, including 6-of-13 from beyond the arc.

Kemba Walker chipped in 19 points, 6 assists and a block, and Jaylen Brown 17 points, 5 boards and a steal while Brad Wanamaker scored 11 points, 6 assists and 5 steals (yes, you read that right) off of the bench.

The Celtics now trail in a series for the first time in the 2020 NBA postseason, but get a chance to even the score on Thursday evening in Game 2.

Watch the video embedded above to see Boston’s full game highlights in their Game 1 loss to get an idea of what the Celtics can do to tighten up for the next game.

We all know they’ll be watching this game again, closely.

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