Sports Morning Headlines - Wednesday, 4/18/12

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Created on Wednesday, 18 April 2012 05:46

Last Updated on Thursday, 16 May 2013 07:51

Written by MVPTexas Morning Sports Report

Rockets pose a problem for the Mavs - Just because Houston has dropped four straight games, Dallas Mavericks forward Dirk Nowitzki acknowledged that now is not the time to fall asleep at the wheel on the Rockets.  "That's another team that always competes,'' Nowitzki said. "I don't care who they throw out there, they play hard and they played us tough twice already.  "They're a good defensive team, they play hard, so they're going to give it their best shot.''   READ MORE

Rockets' loss jeopardizes playoff push - The last-second shot came up short, which seemed ominously appropriate.  Houston Rockets rookie Chandler Parsons put up a 30-footer off a last-ditch inbounds play that sailed soft and true and bumped the front iron.  "It was deep, but it felt good and was right on line," he said. "It just fell short."  So the Denver Nuggets beat the Rockets 105-102 Monday at Toyota Center in Houston. It put the Nuggets (34-27) two games ahead of Houston (33-29) in the Western Conference standings and, if the wind hadn't been knocked out of the Rockets' stomachs yet, Monday's loss had them doubled over and gasping.   READ MORE

Project Spurs:  Hill or Leonard? Leonard or Hill? - After the San Antonio Spurs were eliminated in the first round of the playoffs last season, most everyone knew a change needed to be made.  The Spurs were too small.  What happened they did not expect.  The Spurs traded George Hill to Indiana for the 15th pick in the draft, the 42nd pick and the rights to Erazem Lorbek.  The picks ended up being Kawhi Leonard and Davis Bertans.  The trade stunned Spurs fans and saddened many, including Gregg Popovich and R.C. Buford.  Since then though, Spurs fans have fallen in love with Leonard since they see him as the second coming of Bruce Bowen. So now the question is are the Spurs better or worse with Leonard instead of Hill?  The question isn't completely fair since Hill plays point and two guard and Leonard plays the two and three.  Looking at the raw numbers, Leonard and Hill are having similarly effective seasons.   READ MORE

Rangers 18, Red Sox 3 - The Texas Rangers steamrolled the Boston Red Sox on Tuesday, getting 18 runs on 21 hits and a quality start from Colby Lewis. The Rangers were behind 2-0 after the first inning, but immediately took the lead in the second with four runs and never looked back. Texas mashed six homers (two from Mike Napoli) and scored eight of their runs in the eighth inning alone. It was an impressive game all the way around for the Rangers. It's the club's fifth consecutive win and eighth in its last nine games.   READ MORE

Astros Still Unable To Put It Together Lose 1-0 To Nationals - Remember when people were worried about Wandy Rodriguez's spring stats? Ya, I think Rodriguez has proved that yet again you can't put much value in Spring stats. Through three starts Rodriguez has a 1.96 ERA, but has an 0-2 record because of misplays in the field -- an example of why pitcher wins don't carry much value either.  The Nationals secured the save with, a familiar face to Houston Astro fans, Brad Lidge who collected his second save of the season. To start the inning, it looked like the Astros had gotten 2007 Lidge after Jed Lowrie and J.D. Martinez reached base. Unfortunately Carlos Lee, Chris Johnson and Travis Buck all failed to cash in. One of these days the Astros will put it together, and it will be glorious.   READ MORE

Breaking down Cowboys' 2012 schedule - Who cares if we've known the teams on the Dallas Cowboys 2012 schedule for months now? Nothing's official until we know the actual order of the schedule. Only then can we begin dissecting it as if we have any clue how the Cowboys will finish.  On Tuesday at 6 p.m. local time, the schedules for all 32 teams were released. The New York Giants' schedule is nearly always leaked first, so that's how we start to put the puzzle together. The Cowboys' opponents in 2012 had a combined .504 winning percentage. This is not the most daunting schedule you'll come across, although the early bye week will obviously frustrate coach Jason Garrett and his staff.   READ MORE

Texans 2012 regular season schedule released - The Texans will play a franchise-record five games on national television in 2012, including on Thanksgiving Day for the first time in team history.  The NFL released team schedules Tuesday evening and the Texans will be prominently featured, with two Sunday night games, two Monday night games and a Thanksgiving match-up at the Detroit Lions.  For the fourth consecutive season the Texans will open the season at home-September 9 against the Dolphins. Even though he is no longer in the AFC Central, the Texans did not escape facing Peyton Manning since Houston travels to Denver September 23.  The prime-time games include the Jets in New York Monday, October 8; the Packers at Reliant Stadium Sunday, October 14; at the Bears Sunday November 11; the Thanksgiving Day game in Detroit November 22 and a Monday night tilt against the Patriots December 10.   READ MORE

Texas Stars Report: Big Changes Come Right Away - The 2011-12 campaign came to an end this weekend for the Texas Stars (31-40-3-2, 67 pts, #15 Western Conference). For the first time, this franchise is not going to the playoffs. Less than twelve hours after returning from their final road trip, the axe fell. Dallas announced the firing of Coaches Jeff Pyle and Truitt. As the saying goes, you can't fire all the players.  Realistically, this is something that most have been anticipating for a while. Rumors of Pyle losing the room and conflict with veteran players have been bubbling up for a while. Dallas has also not been pleased with Texas's performance this season, as Joe Nieuwendyk told ESPN Dallas yesterday.  Despite lip service at the beginning of the season that the major and minor league clubs would match up their on-ice systems, they never did. Coach Pyle's heavy forechecking style never changed and didn't mesh well with Coach Gulutzan's more defense-first systems. GM Scott White has a stated desire to build his teams on solid D and goaltending, neither of which was solid under Pyle this season.   READ MORE






---Staff and Wire Reports contributed to this story