Latest news with #RolandoBlackman
Yahoo
21-05-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
"To this day, I can't look him in the eye" - Pat Riley still feels bad about failing to help Patrick Ewing win an NBA title
In a heartfelt reflection, Pat Riley openly shared his deepest regret from his tenure as head coach of the New York Knicks. Years have passed, but the memories of the 1994 NBA Finals continue to weigh heavily on his mind, leading the legendary coach to hold himself accountable for the team's disappointing performance during that pivotal series. Riley's sentiments are particularly focused on Knicks center Patrick Ewing, whose relentless dedication and hard work during that season left a lasting impression on him. He recognized the immense effort "Big Pat" invested in striving for an NBA championship, yet the legendary coach felt he fell short in providing the support necessary for Ewing to achieve that dream. Advertisement "The New York Knicks came after 'Showtime,' but it was one of my all-time favorite teams," Riley opened up in an interview with Andscape in 2017. "Those four years with those guys, led by Patrick, I loved that." "The biggest disappointment in my career was losing the [1994 NBA] championship. I let him down," he confided. "I let him down. I didn't do enough. I could've made a couple of different moves. [Riley regrets not using a fresh Rolando Blackman in Game 7 to spell John Starks, who shot 2-for-18 against Houston.] I could have gotten him better shots. To this day, I can't look him in the eye." Riley believed Ewing gave it all he got in '94 It is common knowledge in the NBA that "The Godfather" was deeply committed to fostering a culture of teamwork and determination in his coaching philosophy. It was also what defined his coaching stint in New York. Among all the players of the Knicks in the '90s, he acknowledged that it was Ewing who truly exemplified the spirit of giving everything he had on the court. Advertisement For Riley, there is no greater way to reward Ewing's relentless effort and dedication than by guiding him to an NBA championship title. Sadly, despite their shared aspirations and hard work, Riley could not achieve this ultimate goal for his star big man during his tenure with the team. "Patrick was a guy that gave everything he could give to that city to try to win a championship," said Riley in a separate discussion. "It's probably one of the biggest disappointments I had in my life not being able to give them enough in Games 6 and 7 when we were in Houston so that Patrick could've gotten his first championship." Related: Walt Frazier admits NBA players were afraid to lift weights back in the day: "Basketball players thought it would affect their shot" A true Knicks icon Despite never clinching an NBA championship with the Knicks, the former Hoya remains a cherished figure among the loyal fans of Madison Square Garden. His extraordinary blend of skills and strength are only matched by the unwavering grit and passion he displayed as the heart and soul of the Knicks. Advertisement Today, Ewing is celebrated as a legendary Knicks player and an iconic leader who left an indelible mark on the franchise. Every now and then, avid "Big Apple" fans fondly remember his contributions, recognizing the dedication and perseverance he brought to every game during his time with the team. His legacy continues to influence the current Knickerbockers team and fans as a beloved symbol of the team's rich history. Related: "I got so much criticism because I was able to shoot" - Ewing on why he wishes he had come up in this era
New York Times
13-05-2025
- Sport
- New York Times
Wild NBA Draft Lottery night opens door to blockbuster trade possibilities
CHICAGO — Well, the NBA Draft Lottery gods have a sense of humor. So much for the idea of Cooper Flagg going to a 20-win team. Instead, a statistically improbable Dallas Mavericks-San Antonio Spurs-Philadelphia 76ers-Charlotte Hornets top four upended all our previous assumptions about what might happen in the lead-up to the NBA Draft. The odds of the Mavs and Spurs landing 1-2 were 1 in 1,000; the Mavs-Spurs-Sixers combo in the top three was 1 in 10,000. Advertisement The winning team, Dallas, hadn't even bothered to have lead executive Nico Harrison on site, so skimpy were its 1.8 percent odds of winning. Instead, assistant GM Matt Riccardi and former Mavs All-Star Rolando Blackman were on the dais posing for photos afterward. Even the participants were shocked at the franchise-altering twists of this particular lottery. 'This s—'s easy,' cracked one beaming exec from a team that lucked into a spot near the top. Meanwhile, another improbable lottery happening repeated from previous cycles: The Eastern Conference can't win, and the Southwest Division can't lose. The Atlanta Hawks won the 2024 lottery in perhaps the least compelling recent year for doing so, but the East was shut out of the top two in the more anticipated 2025 drawing … just like it was in 2015, 2018, 2019 and 2020. Other than the weak 2024 crop, that hasn't happened to the West since 2014. As for the Southwest, its five teams now have six different top-two finishes in the last seven drawings dating to 2019, air-dropping Ja Morant, Victor Wembanyama, Jalen Green, Zion Williamson and the top two picks for Dallas and San Antonio this year into the division. Every team in the division has now landed in the top two in the last eight drafts, plus the division had six other top-five picks in that span that produced Luka Dončić, Jaren Jackson, Jr., Amen Thompson, Jabari Smith Jr., Stephon Castle and Reed Sheppard. I can't emphasize enough: This changes everything. The possibility of trades at the top of the draft just increased exponentially. When we thought the rebuilding teams would end up with the top three picks, we figured there wouldn't be much action; teams like the Washington Wizards or Utah Jazz or Charlotte Hornets would just select a player and keep on rebuilding. Advertisement Instead, three teams that are on much more of a win-now trajectory — Dallas, San Antonio and Philadelphia — own the top three picks. Concurrent with that is talk surrounding Giannis Antetokounmpo's future in Milwaukee and the possibility that the Boston Celtics may suddenly have to reconsider their hugely expensive roster in light of what appears to be a devastating injury to star forward Jayson Tatum. The Mavs, in particular, seem like a team that might want to play ball in the trade market. Flagg is a generational talent, but Dallas' win-now trajectory around Kyrie Irving and Anthony Davis could make it hard to pass on the idea of adding Giannis to the mix. On the flip side, Flagg would allow an aging, crumbling Bucks roster to reset for the next generation. The two sides would have to jump through some salary-cap hoops given the tax-apron position of both, including possibly waiting a month after Flagg signs his rookie contract to execute a deal. He'll be on the cap for $13.8 million once he signs, making a package of Flagg and some other mid-sized contracts (say, P.J. Washington, Daniel Gafford, Jaden Hardy and Dwight Powell) for Antetokounmpo a possibility. Of course, there's a question of positional fit with either Flagg or Antetokounmpo in Dallas next to Davis, especially if Davis insists on playing power forward, which brings up two other possibilities. One is trading Davis and changing the Mavs' entire timeline to fit around Flagg and Dereck Lively II. Irving is already out with a torn ACL, and Dallas controls its 2026 first-round pick; would it be ridiculous to now Ctrl+Z their way out of their Luka-trade silliness and into a different superstar era? Surely they'd have plenty of interest in picks and talent if they made Davis available. The other avenue, we must whisper, is asking Boston about Jaylen Brown. Brown is a much easier positional fit next to Davis and Lively, but he's owed $236 million over the next four seasons, and the Celtics' roster gets frighteningly expensive next season. Would Boston mind resetting around a New England native and waiting out a gap year if Tatum needs it to recover? For that matter, would Dallas do this unless it also had considerable capital coming back in addition to Brown? Advertisement Of course, any bidding war for Antetokounmpo or Brown or Davis is likely to get crowded in a hurry. That's because the two other teams that moved up, San Antonio and Philadelphia, have the opportunity to be significant trade players themselves. The Spurs could always select Rutgers guard Dylan Harper with the second pick, but the San Antonio backcourt looks crowded with midseason pickup De'Aaron Fox and Rookie of the Year Stephon Castle. Could the Spurs put this pick in play, along with the contracts of Jeremy Sochan, Harrison Barnes and Keldon Johnson, and perhaps one or two other goodies, to try to pair a monstrous frontcourt of Antetokounmpo and Victor Wembanyama? On the other hand, is San Antonio's asset haul already so rich — including Castle, Sochan, a lottery pick at No. 14 from Atlanta, a 2027 unprotected Hawks pick and four future swaps — that the Spurs could trade for Giannis without including the second pick, as one rival front-office member suggested to me? (Any Spurs package would likely include Johnson and Barnes as matching salary, although Devin Vassell is another possibility.) Similarly, Philadelphia has the third pick and would seem on track to add either Baylor guard V.J. Edgecombe or Rutgers forward Ace Bailey … except the Sixers' backcourt already has a young All-Star in Tyrese Maxey and last year's most productive rookie in Jared McCain, and the Sixers timeline isn't friendly for a project like Bailey. Thus, might Philadelphia dangle this pick, along with an unprotected 2028 LA Clippers' first and the Sixers' own first in 2031, as a magic wand that turns Paul George (still owed three years and $162 million) into either Giannis or Davis? Can you imagine the other side of this swap, in which a rebuilt Dallas has two of the top three picks and resets around Flagg and Edgecombe (from nearby Baylor)? Further down in the draft, smaller pieces of intrigue remain: • The New Orleans Pelicans fell to seventh and are the mystery meat of this transaction cycle, depending on what new lead exec Joe Dumars decides to do with Zion Williamson. Advertisement • The Brooklyn Nets have long been rumored as an Antetokounmpo pursuer, but their fall to No. 8 combined with the rise of Dallas, San Antonio and Philly was notably unhelpful in that regard. Perhaps it's time for Plan B? • The Houston Rockets' drop to 10th with an unprotected pick from the Phoenix Suns means that selection likely is in play, given the Rockets' push for contention and limited need for another young player. • Similarly, the Portland Trail Blazers dropped to 11th and don't need another developmental player; the Blazers could be players with that pick, especially if it helps them move off crushing contracts for Jerami Grant and/or Deandre Ayton. Finally, the lottery leaves us with two small bits of future-pick housekeeping. First, Philadelphia kept its top-six protected pick owed to the Oklahoma City Thunder — an improbable feat for those who were in the drawing room, as the Sixers' odds of hanging on to it were down to 12 percent after Dallas and San Antonio were drawn first and second. That means the Sixers will owe the Thunder a top-four protected first-rounder in 2026. Second, the Sacramento Kings landed at No. 13 and thus conveyed their first-round pick from the Kevin Huerter trade to Atlanta — something that might not have happened if the Kings had lost their final regular-season game and won Dallas' lottery numbers in the year-end random drawing. Free of that obligation in future years, the Kings can now trade up to five future firsts in any blockbuster swap (four of their own and one from the Minnesota Timberwolves). Nonetheless, the main event here is the flipping of the apple cart at the top of the lottery and what it means for the league's offseason trade cycle. Sure, it's possible the Mavs, Spurs and Sixers just make picks with their newfound riches. It just seems much, much, much more possible that we get trades at the top of the draft board than it did when the week began. (Photo of Rolando Blackman: David Banks / Imagn Images)
New York Times
13-05-2025
- Sport
- New York Times
Mavericks' lottery miracle gives beaten-down fan base reason to be hopeful again
When Nico Harrison traded Luka Dončić in February, he sliced his team's competitive window down two or three years. The Dallas Mavericks already didn't control their first-round picks from 2027 to 2030 before Harrison swapped a then 25-year-old Dončić for Anthony Davis, a player six years Dončić's senior. Advertisement Harrison's bet on Davis was a bust in Year One, and after Davis went down with an adductor strain in February and Kyrie Irving tore his ACL in March, concern crept in that the Mavericks could be re-entering dark days not seen in Dallas since the 1990s. On Monday, the ping-pong balls at the NBA Draft Lottery in Chicago bounced in a way that will ensure that doesn't happen. The Mavericks came away with the No. 1 pick — a scenario that had a 1.8 percent chance of occurring. That puts the Mavericks in position to draft Cooper Flagg, a one-and-done forward from Duke good enough to contribute to winning right away and young enough to give the Mavericks an identity once Davis and Irving age out of their primes. 'For us, it's been a rough year, as you all know,' said former Maverick Rolando Blackman, who was the team's on-stage representative, in an interview with ESPN. 'But the important part of the whole thing is that we'll get a chance to move our franchise forward.' Before Monday's miracle, the Mavericks remained stuck in the doom loop that started when they traded Dončić. In his return to Dallas on April 9, Dončić torched his former team with 45 points. Mavericks fans cheered Dončić and demanded Harrison be fired, as 'FIRE NICO!' chants were heard any time one of Dallas' players stepped to the free-throw line. With Irving sidelined until early 2026, it didn't appear the situation would improve any time soon, either. But Dallas leaping up 10 slots from its pre-lottery position of No. 11 to No. 1 changes everything. Flagg, who turned 18 in December, has already shown he can hang with the grown men he'll compete against in the NBA. Last summer, he was the only college player who was a part of the Team USA Select Team, which got to scrimmage against the American squad that won gold in Paris. One of the videos that surfaced from those tune-up games featured Flagg splashing a 3 over Davis and then running the floor for an impressive and-1 put-back. Duke commit Cooper Flagg has taken over USA Basketball scrimmage: hits a three and then finishes a tough putback — Ben Golliver (@BenGolliver) July 8, 2024 In his lone college season at Duke, Flagg solidified himself as the best prospect in the country, averaging 19.2 points, 7.5 rebounds, 4.2 assists, 1.4 steals and 1.4 blocks. Flagg shot the 3 at a high level (38.5 percent on 3.6 attempts), flashed pull-up shooting ability, crammed highlight dunks and was a force defensively. The Blue Devils won 35 games, the most for the program in more than a decade. Advertisement If the Mavericks draft Flagg next month, he'll add to the impressive collection of frontcourt players the team has assembled. Dallas wanted to start P.J. Washington, Anthony Davis and Dereck Lively II together last season when healthy and bring Daniel Gafford off the bench. Flagg can be plugged in at either forward spot. It's possible his addition could create a situation where Dallas has too many talented frontcourt players and not enough minutes to go around. Thinning out that group is one way the Mavericks could acquire the ballhandling they still desperately need. Right now, Dallas has one point guard under contract next season who will be healthy on opening night: Brandon Williams, who spent most of last season on a two-way deal. Before Monday, the Mavericks had never moved up in the draft lottery in the 16 times they'd been a part of it. Harrison celebrated this franchise first with other members of the team's front office at a dinner. Harrison stood up as soon as the lottery results were announced and exchanged high-fives and hugs. The reaction was pure jubilation from the Mavericks chief decision maker whose approval rating had nose-dived post Dončić trade. The moment we won 🙌 #MFFL — Dallas Mavericks (@dallasmavs) May 13, 2025 One of the most telling things Harrison said about the Dončić deal came on Feb. 2, the morning after it was completed. Harrison told a small group of reporters: 'The future to me is three, four years from now. Ten years from now, I don't know. They'll probably bury me and (Mavericks coach) J(ason Kidd) by then.' It was easy to interpret those comments as Harrison not caring about what happened to the Mavericks over the long term. Failing to maximize the trade return for Dončić meant the Mavericks' future after Davis and Irving looked bleak. Advertisement Now, that's no longer the case. Flagg is a two-way monster whose games has shades of a young Kawhi Leonard in San Antonio. If Dallas chooses him No. 1 next month, Flagg gives Mavericks fans hope that their team won't be wandering in the wilderness when their 30-something stars begin to fade. (Photo of Rolando Blackman: Jeff Haynes / NBAE via Getty Images)
RTHK
13-05-2025
- Sport
- RTHK
Mavericks win NBA draft lottery in stunner
Mavericks win NBA draft lottery in stunner Rolando Blackman (left) of the Dallas Mavericks with NBA Deputy Commissioner Mark Tatum after winning the the first pick. Photo: Reuters The Dallas Mavericks have won the top pick in the NBA Draft lottery, leaving them in pole position to select talented top college prospect Cooper Flagg. The Mavericks – who had only a 1.8 percent chance of landing the top pick under the NBA's complex lottery rules – have now been gifted a golden opportunity to rebuild following their shock decision to trade Luka Doncic in February. "Its been a rough year for us as we all know," said Dallas legend Rolando Blackman, the four-time All-Star who was chosen by the club to represent the Mavs at the draw in Chicago. "But the important part of the whole thing is that we'll get a chance to move our franchise forward," he added. The 18-year-old Flagg is the overwhelming favorite to be selected with the No.1 pick at the 2025 Draft, which will be held from June 25 to 26 at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. The 6ft 9in (2.05 metre) forward declared for the draft last month after just a single season in college basketball with Duke University in which he was named as national player of the year. Many observers see Flagg as a generational talent, citing his rare blend of size, athleticism and skill, which helped him average 19.2 points, 7.5 rebounds and 4.2 assists per game in college basketball. "His highlights, his statistics, the ways he impacted the game on both ends of the floor, really in every category, was off the charts," Duke coach Jon Scheyer said last month. Asked on Monday what Flagg could bring to the Mavericks, Blackman replied: "Well the main factor is that he can hoop. He can play. There are a lot of great players in that draft class, and the important thing is that we'll see how the guys get together and make the team better." Flagg meanwhile told ESPN he had not given much thought about his likely draft destination. "I didn't try and think about it too much," Flagg said. "I feel like it's kind of out of my control. So I'm just going through the process like everybody else and trying to enjoy every single moment." The 14 teams which didn't make the NBA playoffs entered the draft lottery, although the Houston Rockets, who finished second in the Western Conference, were included due to previous trade deals. Elsewhere in Monday's lottery, the San Antonio Spurs won the second pick in the draft, with the Philadelphia 76ers third. The Charlotte Hornets will have the fourth pick while the Utah Jazz – who had the worst record in the NBA during the regular season, finishing bottom of the Western Conference with a 17-65 record – will have the fifth pick. (AFP)
