By the Associated Press

SALT LAKE CITY — Rudy Gobert had 15 points, 13 rebounds, and six blocked shots, leading the Utah Jazz to a 109-92 victory over the Charlotte Hornets on Friday night.

Jordan Clarkson led the Jazz with 20 points off the bench. Bojan Bogdanovic added 16 points and Georges Niang chipped in 15 while matching his career high with five 3-pointers.

Utah has won eight straight games and 13 of 14.

Terry Rozier scored 23 points to lead the Hornets. Miles Bridges added 11. Charlotte finished with 21 turnovers, leading to 24 points for the Jazz. The Hornets have lost three straight.

The Jazz swept the regular-season series with the Hornets for the second straight season.

Charlotte struggled under intense defensive pressure from the Jazz from the opening tip. Utah forced seven turnovers in the first quarter alone. The Jazz racked up 14 of their first 19 points off those miscues.

Utah raced to a huge lead. The Jazz outscored the Hornets 19-2 over a five-minute stretch for a 29-11 advantage late in the first quarter. Bogdanovic, Royce O’Neale and Niang combined for four 3-pointers to fuel the run. Gobert bookended the outburst with a pair of dunks.

Utah kept the pressure on in the second quarter. The Jazz extended their lead to 25 points lead three times in the two minutes before halftime, and led 61-36 on a dunk by Gobert.

Gobert was a force at both ends of the court in the first half. He blocked four shots, matching his total blocks over the previous four games.

Source: Manila Bulletin

By Agence France-Presse

Two-time NBA champion Kevin Durant was called a “coward” who made “the weakest move in NBA history” by former Oklahoma City teammate Kendrick Perkins in an intense Twitter exchange.

Perkins, who played alongside Durant over parts of five seasons from 2011 to 2015 before being traded to Utah, ripped Durant for leaving the Thunder in July 2016 to join the Golden State Warriors.

The Warriors were coming off an NBA record 73-9 season that ended with a loss to LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers in the 2016 NBA Finals. After signing Durant, the Warriors reclaimed the throne in 2017 and 2018 before falling to Toronto last year, when Durant was injured for most of the playoffs.

Durant suffered a torn right Achilles tendon in game five of last year’s NBA Finals and departed the Warriors last July to join the Brooklyn Nets, although his injury will keep him out for the entire season.

Perkins, who retired in 2018 and became a television analyst, tweeted that their former teammate Russell Westbrook was the best player in Thunder history, noting “KD lost in the second round without Russ when I was there. So what that mean?”

Durant replied, “Yea and our starting center Kendrick Perkins averaged a whopping 2 (points) and 3 (rebounds) during that series. U played hard tho champ lol.”

Perkins responded with: “Boy stop you did the weakest move in NBA history!!! Up on a team 3-1 in the western conference finals and then go join them the following seasons?! Heart of Champion right there.”

He was referring to the Thunder owning a 3-1 lead on the Warriors in the Western Conference final before losing the last three games and watching Golden State advance to the 2016 finals.

Durant swiped at Perkins for poor production, tweeting, “Weak is starting at center, playing real minutes with no production. Should’ve worked on your skills as much as I did.”

That’s when Perkins blasted Durant and questioned how strong his claim should be as an NBA champion after joining such a powerful squad, although Durant was twice named the NBA Finals Most Valuable Player while alongside Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson in defeats of James-led Cleveland.

“That’s fine!!!” Perkins tweeted. “You worked that hard and still had to go join a 73-9 team. Truth be told you don’t even feel like a real Champ, you have hard time sleeping at night huh knowing that you took the coward way out!!!”

Source: Manila Bulletin

By Agence France-Presse

Turkish NBA star Enes Kanter renewed his criticism of Turkey President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and hinted at a future in politics in two interviews released Friday.

The Swiss-born Boston Celtics ace, who hopes to become a US citizen next year, spoke to The Hill newspaper and CBS News, saying he was sad to see Erdogan meet with US President Donald Trump at the White House last November.

“You’re the president meeting with, I will say, dictators like Erdogan, that definitely frustrates me,” Kanter told the Hill. “It makes me really sad.”

Kanter, who has repeatedly ripped Erdogan for human rights abuses, told CBS he is a friend of Fethullah Gulen, an Erdogan opponent living in exile in Pennsylvania. Erdogan says Gulen organized an attempted 2017 coup, something Kanter says isn’t true.

“Are you kidding me? I was with Gulen that night,” Kanter told CBS.

Kanter, 27, says he has cultivated friendships with US lawmakers in nine NBA seasons with Utah, Oklahoma City, New York, Portland and Boston, having joined the Celtics last July.

And he’s pondering a career in Washington once his NBA days are done.

“I’ve been talking to a lot of congressmen, congresswomen, presidential candidates, so I’m like, you know what, why not just become one?” Kanter told The Hill.

Also on his wish list after a brief foray into World Wrestling Entertainment last year is a wrestling show career.

“Post-NBA, this is going to sound weird but I actually want to join the WWE, become a wrestler. I just love WWE.”

Kanter predicted a Celtics’ victory over current NBA pace-setter Milwaukee in the Eastern Conference finals and an NBA Finals showdown against a Los Angeles team, the LeBron James-led Lakers or Kawhi Leonard-powered Clippers.

At 25-11, the Celtics are on a three-game losing skid and have fallen to third in the East, 6 1/2 games behind NBA win leader-Milwaukee.

Kanter has averaged 8.7 points, 8.2 rebounds and 1.1 assists a game for the Celtics in 29 appearances this season.

Kanter, an outspoken Erdogan critic over human rights issues, had his passport revoked by the Turkish government in 2017 and was grounded in Romania, where he dubbed Erdogan “the Hitler of our century” and was stranded until the NBA worked with the US State Department to enable him to travel to New York.

“Lots of people talk about these issues. But they’re either in jail or they don’t have a platform,” Kanter told CBS. “Just because I play in the NBA, I have this huge platform. I’m trying to use this platform to be the voice of all those innocent people who don’t have one.”

Source: Manila Bulletin

By Agence France-Presse

Novak Djokovic on Saturday pulled out of the upcoming Adelaide International in a big blow to the new tournament.

The world number two has been leading Serbia at the ATP Cup team event in Sydney, where they face Russia in a semifinal on Saturday.

No explanation was given by officials who confirmed his absence from the ATP-WTA tournament, whose women’s field is headed by top-ranked Ashleigh Barty.

“We know how disappointed Novak is about not being able to play in Adelaide this year and we hope to welcome him to the tournament next year,” tournament director Alistair MacDonald said.

“We understand his decision and wish him the very best of luck for the remainder of the ATP Cup and the upcoming Australian Open.”

Djokovic had planned to use the hardcourt tournament in South Australia, starting Sunday, as a final tune-up for the Australian Open Grand Slam, which begins a week from Monday.

Source: Manila Bulletin

By Agence France-Presse

United States World Cup icon Megan Rapinoe Friday vowed that athletes “will not be silenced” after the International Olympic Committee warned against political protests at the Tokyo Games.

“So much being done about the protests,” Rapinoe said in an Instagram post. “So little being done about what we are protesting about.

“We will not be silenced.”

Rapinoe’s comments were accompanied by a graphic showing fists raised through the interlocking rings — under the crossed out words “kneeling, hand gestures, signs.”

The post comes after IOC chief Thomas Bach reiterated that athletes, coaches, trainers and officials are banned from political protests on the field of play, at the Olympic Village, during the opening and closing ceremonies and on the medal podium.

“If this political neutrality is not respected, then the Olympic Games will divide, and not unite, the world,” Bach insisted.

The guidelines issued Thursday by the IOC on specific actions that are banned and will draw sanctions, come after two US athletes were reprimanded by the US Olympic Committee for medal podium protests at the Pan American Games in Lima.

Fencer Race Imboden kneeled and hammer thrower Gwen Berry raised a fist in protest. Both received 12 months probation.

Rapinoe has been outspoken on political issues during her career, speaking out about issues including gender equality and racism.

In 2016, she joined former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick in kneeling during the national anthem to protest racial inequality in America.

 

Source: Manila Bulletin

By the Associated Press

MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Jaren Jackson Jr. scored 24 points, Ja Morant added 22 points and a season-high 14 assists and the Memphis Grizzlies won their fourth-straight game, beating the San Antonio Spurs 134-121 on Friday night.

Dillon Brooks also scored 22 points and Jonas Valanciunas added 21 as six Memphis players scored in double figures.

The victory put the Grizzlies percentage points ahead of the Spurs for eighth place in the Western Conference.

DeMar DeRozan matched his season-high with 36 points, and added nine assists for the Spurs. LaMarcus Aldridge and Bryn Forbes each scored 21 points, combining to go 9 of 17 from 3-point range. Rudy Gay added 13 points.

One of Aldridge’s 3-pointers pulled the Spurs within 116-113 with 6:28 remaining. But the Grizzlies converted a trio of 3-pointers, two from Brooks, and built their lead to 125-113. San Antonio never got closer than eight points the rest of the way.

DeRozan helped keep the Spurs close in the third quarter, scoring 18 in the frame as Memphis held a scant 100-98 lead heading into the fourth.

Unlike when the Spurs defeated the Grizzlies 145-115 on Dec. 23, Memphis charged to a double-digit lead in the first half, with the advantage reaching 15 points. But the Grizzlies squandered much of the advantage in the closing minutes of the first half, clinging to a 63-57 lead at halftime.

Aldridge and DeRozan had 13 each for San Antonio, while Jackson and Valanciunas scored 11 apiece for Memphis. Jackson missed just one of his four 3-point shots.

Source: Manila Bulletin

By the Associated Press

LAUSANNE, Switzerland— The political neutrality of the Olympics would be undercut if an athlete took a knee in protest on the medal podium at this year’s Tokyo Games, IOC President Thomas Bach said Friday.

One day after the International Olympic Committee published guidelines specifying which type of protests are prohibited in venues and medal ceremonies, Bach added his support.

“They (the Olympics) are not and must never be a platform to advance political or any other divisive ends,” Bach said to an audience that included the heads of international sports federations. “Our political neutrality is undermined whenever organizations or individuals attempt to use the Olympic Games as a stage for their own agendas, as legitimate as they may be.”

Bach robustly defended two long-standing Olympic Charter rules in a 25-minute speech. Rule 50 prohibits any “demonstration or political, religious or racial propaganda” in Olympic areas. Rule 40 restricts an athlete’s ability to promote his or her own sponsors at a time when many of them receive a huge amount of attention.

Taking a knee, making hand gestures with political meaning, and refusing to respect fellow medalists on the podium are highlighted as “divisive disruption” in the new guidelines.

Recent examples of such protests have been seen at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics, the swimming world championships and the Pan-American Games.

Athletes copying the iconic raised fist salutes by American sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos at the 1968 Mexico City Olympics could be sent home from Tokyo as part of three potential rounds of disciplinary action — by their team, their sport, and the IOC.

Bach cautioned that “the eyes of the world will be on the athletes and the Olympic Games” in Tokyo.

The protest guidelines — which allow athletes to express political opinions on their social media accounts — were formally approved by the IOC Athletes’ Commission. That panel rarely takes a different view from the Bach-chaired IOC executive board.

The Athletes’ Commission has also advised competitors against acting independently to challenge Rule 40 or support commercially-run sports events organized outside the Olympic system.

“Our solidarity-based model is not for sale,” Bach said Friday.

The IOC has long argued that promising exclusivity to Olympic sponsors — including Coca-Cola, Intel and Visa — maintains the value of those deals to ensure more money is available for distribution to games organizers, sports and national Olympic bodies.

Revenue was $5.6 billion from television and commercial deals in a four-year cycle tied to the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi and 2016 Summer Games in Rio de Janeiro.

Bach warned against a “purely profit-driven” IOC finance model.

The current system, which limits an athlete’s personal earning potential, helped ensure an Olympics with 33 sports in Tokyo and teams from all 206 national Olympic bodies, whose travel and accommodations costs are covered, he said.

More than 1,600 athletes worldwide are getting Olympic scholarships to train.

“With our values of peace, unity and solidarity, we stand in sharp contrast to the zeitgeist of our times,” said Bach, identifying “divisions, of nationalism and of discrimination.”

Source: Manila Bulletin

By the Associated Press

TORONTO  — Raptors swingman Norman Powell was cleared to play Sunday against San Antonio while star forward Pascal Siakam and center Marc Gasol are close to returning.

Coach Nick Nurse said the three core players — all injured during a Dec. 18 victory at Detroit — were able to practice more Friday.

Powell hurt his left shoulder, the same injury that caused him to miss 21 games last season. Gasol strained his left hamstring and Siakam injured his groin.

The Raptors have gone 6-5 since losing the three, holding down fourth place in the Eastern Conference. Toronto also has played the last two games without starting guard Fred VanVleet, who is recovering from a hamstring strain.

Powell’s return should give the offense a boost. He is averaging 14.4 points and topped 20 points in three straight games before his injury.

Nurse said Sunday was “a bit ambitious” for Siakam and Gasol to return. There was still no timetable for VanVleet, who Nurse said is “still immobile but making progress.”

Source: Manila Bulletin

By the Associated Press

NEW YORK  — Miami’s Jimmy Butler was fined $35,000 and Indiana’s T.J. Warren $25,000 by the NBA on Friday, two days after their altercation in the Heat’s victory in Indianapolis.

The NBA noted that Butler escalated the situation on social media after the game. Warren made an obscene gesture after his ejection.

Warren grabbed Butler by the left arm and spun him around as Butler went for a potential layup with 6:29 remaining in the third quarter. They chest-bumped and were separated by referees. Both players received technical fouls.

Seven seconds later, Butler was called for an offensive foul for putting his shoulder into Warren’s chest. It was upgraded to a Flagrant Foul 1 upon league review. Warren was ejected after getting his second technical foul for taunting after applauding the call.

As Warren left the court, Butler blew kisses in his direction.

Source: Manila Bulletin

By the Associated Press

NEW YORK — Brandon Ingram scored 28 points, Jaxson Hayes had 18 points and 10 rebounds, and the New Orleans Pelicans beat the New York Knicks 123-111 Friday night.

Lonzo Ball had 15 points and 11 assists, and Josh Hart added 13 points and 10 rebounds as the Pelicans won for the seventh time in their last nine games.

Taj Gibson led the Knicks with a season-high 19 points, shooting 8 for 8 from the field. RJ Barrett scored 16 points, and Reggie Bullock and Elfrid Payton finished with 15. The Knicks lost their fifth straight following a season-best three-game winning streak.

Ingram had 10 points in the first quarter and Gibson scored 10 of the Knicks’ first 23 points. New York had several three-point leads and the Pelicans were never ahead by more than five before settling for a 33-31 edge after the first quarter.

Things opened up a bit in the second quarter. The Pelicans went on a 15-3 run to take their largest advantage of the half, 53-42, and led the rest of the way.

New York scored the next seven points and pulled to 56-53, but Ingram scored seven of his 17 first-half points in the final minute to give the Pelicans a 67-61 halftime lead.

The Knicks scored the first five points of the second half, with Barrett’s free throw bringing them to 67-66. New Orleans was ahead 76-74 before a 9-0 spurt before settling for a 95-86 advantage at the end of the third quarter.

Ball’s uncontested layup with 3:06 left produced a 118-100 advantage for the Pelicans.

JJ Redick (12) and E’Twuan Moore (11) also scored in double figures for the Pelicans.

Bobby Portis added 13 points and Mitchell Robinson scored 12 for the Knicks.

Source: Manila Bulletin