About Last Weekend: Knicks Start Their Summer Vacation

Nathaniel S. Butler/NBAE/Getty Images Roy Hibbert

In case you were out welcoming summer by busting out the old double Dutch (and failing, because double-Dutching is really hard, guys, stop laughing) here’s what you missed in sports last weekend:

  • The New York Knicks were eliminated in six games by the Indiana Pacers in the Eastern Conference semifinals. The defeat proves their season, in which they won their first division championship since 1994 and 50 games for the first time since 2000, was an utter and abysmal failure. Their capitulation to a comparably good team that was able to steal an early game at Madison Square Garden and then hold serve at its home arena, which was among the hardest places to get a win in the NBA all season, further proves that the team needs to be torn down, because the guys on the Knicks just don’t care enough. Sure, they were a magnificent block from one of the few true centers left in the game away from forcing a Game 7 at home, but I think it’s clear, based on this series, that the New York Chokes (clever nickname, eh?) are the lousiest bunch of basketball players the NBA has ever seen, and they should return their salaries to team owner James Dolan before turning themselves into the NYPD for crimes against the state.
  • Oxbow upset Kentucky Derby winner Orb to win the Preakness Stakes after going out as a 15-1 longshot. The win was a boon for the small population of semi-literate foodies, who misread the horse’s name and have little understanding of how horse racing works, as they placed large amounts of money banking on the resurgent popularity of the ingredient oxtail to carry the day. In somewhat related news, someone in Florida just won $600 million playing Powerball.
  • Behind an excellent two-way effort, the San Antonio Spurs jumped out to a 1-0 lead over the Memphis Grizzlies with a 105-83 win in San Antonio. Grizzlies power forward Zach Randolph, who was held to only two points on 1-8 shooting, said after the game, “Y’all look surprised. Um … I’m Zach Randolph. Come on, guys. It’s cool. This is a thing I do. Next time, I probably won’t. But maybe I will. I’m Zach Randolph.”
  • Daniel Alfredsson and the Ottawa Senators clawed back into their series with the Pittsburgh Penguins with a thrilling 2-1 double-overtime win at Scotiabank Place. “This was our most effective anti-Penguin action since we filibustered that climate change legislation,” said goal scorer and vice-chair of the Senate Energy Committee Colin Greening. “Fortunately we’re not the sort of body that is able to muster a lot of will toward pro-penguin legislation, so I expect we have a very good chance of secure passage to the Eastern Conference finals.”
  • The New York Rangers have dug themselves an early two-game deficit after falling to the Boston Bruins 5-2 at the TD Center. “They say not to get too confident,” Bruins head coach Claude Julien said after the game, “but we’ve got this, 2-0 is unerasable.” When asked about his team’s concession of a 2-0 lead in the previous round, Julien added, “We won didn’t we?” before miming a mic drop and strutting out of the press conference, after which a subordinate was forced to turn off his actual microphone.
  • Sang-Moon Bae won his first PGA tournament, overtaking Keegan Bradley in the final round to win the Byron Nelson Classic at 13-under. After the tournament, Bae thanked his devoted fans, saying, “I couldn’t have done it without my fans, the Moonies, Not Those Moonies, But The Moonies Who Support Sang-Moon Bae, Who Is Not Related To The Unification Church, or the MNTMBTMWSSMBWISNRTTUCes, out there who have been waiting for this moment since I started playing on the circuit.”
  • Arsenal, behind a 1-0 win over Newcastle United, eked out the final Champions League entrance from the Premier League, pipping north London rivals Tottenham Hotspur by a single point. Spurs winger Gareth Bale, distraught over the result, fell to the ground, stood up, fell to the ground again, tried to stand up, fell over, got up onto his knees, fell over, propped his head up on his hands, somehow fell over from that position, stood all the way up, fell over, stood up again, fell over again, stood up one final time, and howled, “None of that was a gesture of sadness,” before falling over yet again.
  • Matt Moore has extended his hot start to 8-0 as he led the Tampa Bay Rays to a sweep of the Baltimore Orioles with a 3-1 win at Camden Yards. The game featured a long delay as both managers, Buck Showalter and Joe Maddon, argued over what was eventually ruled, after replay, to be a Matt Joyce home run. After the ruling, turn-of-the-century Hall of Famers Ty Cobb and Christy Mathewson rose from their respective graves to take revenge on behalf of the ruined sanctity of the game, devouring the brains of both Showalter and Maddon before returning to the plots from which they rose.
  • Former Everton midfielder Tim Cahill delivered a stoppage-time winner as the New York Red Bulls beat the Los Angeles Galaxy 1-0. Cahill, after scoring, proceeded to do the traditional Red Bull goal-scoring celebration of making a disgusted face and saying, “Screw it, I’m not that tired, I’ll just have a cup of coffee.”

Filed Under: About Last Weekend, Baltimore Orioles, Boston Bruins, Champions League, Indiana Pacers, Memphis Grizzlies, New York Knicks, New York Rangers, Ottawa Senators, Pittsburgh Penguins, Premier League, San Antonio Spurs, Tampa Bay Rays