Tony Parker schools Kyrie Irving, the Heat subdue the Thunder, and Michael Jordan continues to be a massive presence in the game of basketball.
Every week, the NBA gets closer and closer to the playoffs, at which point whatever team has LeBron James will win the championship. Just kidding! It's like way more exciting and complicated than that (we hope). Here are the five most fascinating stories of basketball season as it currently stands.
Tony Parker Puts Kyrie Irving In His Place
Image by Aaron Josefczyk / Reuters
The way we talk about Kyrie Irving now — What We Talk About When We Talk About Kyrie Irving — is as though he's already reached the heights of basketball ascendancy. And this isn't wrong! He has. On most nights, Irving plays like one of the league's five best point guards, and he snagged a spot in the All-Star Game on his own legitimate merits. That being said, sometimes we need to be reminded that Irving, only 20 years old, has not reached his full potential and is not the league's best point guard. Wednesday night, Tony Parker did that reminding. It took all of the game's minutes for Parker's Spurs to take and hold a lead against Irving's Cavs, but in terms of the one-on-one battle between the two point guards, Irving got beat. Parker, one of the leading candidates for this year's MVP award — and by leading, I mean, one of the guys who we'll pat on the back heartily when either Durant or LeBron wins — dropped 24 points on only 14 shots, plus seven assists and six rebounds. Irving, meanwhile, need 15 shots to get six points, and couldn't even get off a last-second attempt to win while being covered by Parker.
