HOCKEY

In the NHL, the Boston Bruins had a chance to even the series on the mighty Vancouver Canucks.  Going into Boston’s home stand, there was a lot of criticism about Boston’s goalie Tim Thomas.  He was viewed as mediocre and far inferior to Vancouver’s goalie Roberto Luongo.  But, suddenly, Thomas has turned into a hero.  On Monday, he only gave up 1 goal, and Wednesday night… he wouldn’t give up ANY.  In fact, anytime the Boston defense broke down, Thomas bailed them out of the jam by making an incredible save.  Last night, the Bruins did all the scoring, including a beautiful goal from Michael Ryder.  And the Bruins win again, and now look like the better team in the series.  Vancouver looked sluggish out there and failed to stop the Bruins when it counted.  So now, we have two championships to watch tied at 2-2.  Boston 4, Vancouver 0.

BASKETBALL

In the NBA, Charles Barkley, always one to share his opinion, has publicly said that he just can’t root for the Heat.  He thinks they’re a “whiny bunch”.  He also ripped Miami Heat fans saying that they, essentially, have no passion.  Barkley stated that when he’s in Chicago, for example, it’s loud, and in Dallas it’s crazy.  But in Miami… it’s quiet.  This is just another way of Barkley calling Miami’s fans fair weather.  After all, their attendance was pretty shoddy until they landed LeBron and Bosh.  Sure, they’ve gone on a run this post-season, but it’s pretty clear that, like Barkley, most of America is rooting against the Heat.

And, of course, Thursday night is Game 5 of the NBA Finals.  Most believe that whichever team wins Game 5 will win the series.  However, this is a MUST WIN game for the Mavericks.  There is no way that the Mavs can win 2 games back-to-back in Miami.  Charles Barkely said that anybody who thinks that is an idiot.  And, in some interesting news, the Mavericks’ DeShawn Stevenson went on the Jim Rome show and said that LeBron basically “checked out” at the end of Game 4.  LeBron received a lot of criticism for this, and Stevenson said this, of course, was good for Dallas, but that it looked like LeBron just stood around and watched D-Wade catch fire and decided to relax.  This goes back to the ego thing that everybody was worried about.  If Dwyane Wade is THE MAN, that makes LeBron the Pippen to his Jordan.  And people that are world renowned as superstars don’t take well to this.  Either way, it’s going to be an action-packed Game 5.