Ever since Boston College joined the ACC, the Eagles football program has continued to make strides in the right direction. Last year they were victorious in the Champs Sports Bowl 24-21 over Michigan St., they finished the season rated in the Top 10 of the AP poll and then had two of their players (Matt Ryan and DeJuan Tribble) drafted 3rd and 17th in the NFL Lottery. The future continues to look very bright for the Eagles and expectations are high for the 2008 campaign.

BC returns the core of their upperclassman defensive unit which last season held opponents to an average of 16.9 points a game in their 11 wins. On the offensive side of things, Chris Crane will replace Ryan as the starting QB in the fall. Crane who stands at 6′5″ tall and has a solid 220 lb frame dominated the spring ball workouts and left no one guessing as to who would win the starting job.

Crane is also very excited about the potential starting running back in Josh Haden. This kid’s got tons of speed and lots of potential to be the next superstar back in the conference.

“He’s here, and he’s working real hard,” said Crane of Haden. “During practice we’ve done some live snaps and he’s broken off a couple around the edge and ran up the sideline. He only needs a little crease and he’s strong enough upper body and lower body wise to break through that hole and break arm tackles.”

The Eagles will continue to work hard over the summer to put themselves in great game shape come the fall season. Barring any injuries they will most likely be the pre-season favorites to win the ACC.

2008 Schedule
Aug. 30 - @ Kent State
Sept. 6 – Georgia Tech
Sept. 20 – Central Florida
Sept. 27 – Rhode Island
Oct. 4 – @ N.C. State
Oct. 18 – Virginia Tech
Oct. 25 – @ North Carolina
Nov. 1 - Clemson
Nov. 8 – Notre Dame
Nov. 15 - @ Florida State
Nov. 22 - @ Wake Forest
Nov. 29 – Maryland

Tickets are now available for all 2008 BC Eagles Football games!

Midway through the 2008 NBA season, the Los Angeles Lakers sat right in the middle of the pack of all the Western Conference powerhouses. The Rockets were in the midst of reeling off a 20+ game winning streak, the Suns had acquired Shaquille O’Neal and the defending champs in the Spurs were simply on fire. That’s right about when some guy named Kobe decided that it was time to start playing some ball, and he and the Lakers haven’t stopped since.

The reigning MVP dropped 39 points en route to Los Angeles’s 100-92 victory over the San Antonio Spurs Thursday night, securing a spot in the NBA Finals for the first time since 2004.

“I think it is a tremendous accomplishment,” Bryant said. “I think the West is extremely tough. We’re all extremely excited and proud about it. Now, it’s time to go on and see if we can’t finish it off.”

The Lakers trailed by 13 points after one quarter and gradually chipped away from the deficit with the help of Bryant’s firepower. At the end of three quarters of play, the Lakers had gained a 1 point advantage on a 3-point field goal by Vladimir Radmanovic (8 pts) that came with :28 seconds left on the game clock. The teams would trade buckets for the first two minutes of play in the 4th quarter before Luke Walton (5 pts) nailed his only 3-pointer of the game giving L.A. the 70-68 edge, a lead they would not lose the rest of the game.

Midseason acquisition Pau Gasol might be the most excited member of this Lakers line-up to be heading to the finals. Halfway through his season he was stuck on an awful Memphis Grizzlies team that was already making golf reservations for their summer plans. A trade right before the deadline moved Gasol into Lakerland and both parties couldn’t be happier with what they got. In yesterday’s win, Gasol netted 12 points and grabbed a playoff career-high 19 rebounds.
The only other Laker in double-figures was veteran forward Lamar Odom. Odom finished with 13 points on a 5 for 10 shooting performance and grabbed 8 rebounds in 34 minutes of action.

“My heart’s still pumping, that adrenaline is still running from the game,” said Odom. “Maybe when I sit down and have something to eat, I’ll realize what just happened. We came out here, played our game, and won. It’s satisfying, but one more step.”

That next step will be against either the Boston Celtics or Detroit Pistons in the NBA Finals, which begin on June 5th. The Celtics currently hold a 3-2 series lead with Game 6 taking place tonight in Detroit. The Lakers will certainly be watching intently but coach Phil Jackson knows that no matter who the opponent, it will be a challenging series.

“We look at both those opponents (Boston and Detroit) with a great deal of respect and know that we have a great, great hill to climb to be able to finish in the finals and win,” said Jackson who will be going for his 10th NBA championship ring. Currently, he is tied with former Celtics coach and legend Red Auerbach with 9 titles as head coach.

While Jackson credits the Western Conference title win as a team effort, Spurs head coach Greg Popovich points out that his team’s offensive struggles combined with L.A.’s defensive intensity were the keys to them winning the series.
“I thought we did a fine job,” he said. “We just didn’t muster the offense, for a variety of reasons. The fact that we didn’t come through offensively is a disappointment, but part of that is a credit to the Lakers. We just played a team that was better. That’s why the Lakers won. The better team won. You get a seven-game series, you win four games, you’re the best team.”

Tim Duncan’s effort in the loss was outstanding. The former MVP scored 19 points, hauled down 15 boards and dished out 10 assists for a triple-double. It just wasn’t enough to lift the Spurs past Kobe and the rest of the Lakers lineup.

“Just got to gear it up again to go to next year,” Duncan said. “Love what we had this year. We just weren’t good enough through stretches.”

Now all the Lakers can do is sit and wait because their next stop is the 2008 NBA Finals.

For the Boston Red Sox, the 2008 campaign thus far has been a tale of two cities. At 21-5, the BoSox own the best home record in MLB but after last nights 1-0 loss to the Seattle Mariners, Boston’s road record drops to 11-19 which is 2nd worst in the American League.

Eric Bedard pitched 7 shutout innings allowing only 2 hits while striking out 8 Sox to earn his fourth win of the season. His stuff was downright filthy and had Boston hitters guessing all night. During the off season, Seattle traded away 5 prospects to acquire the staff ace and last night everyone got to see the pitcher the Mariners had hoped to be getting all year long.

Bedard was relieved by Brandon Morrow in the 8th and after recording all three outs for his 3rd hold of the year, closer J.J. Putz entered the game for the 9th and notched his 6th save on the season.

For Boston, Tim Wakefield pitched an almost equally as impressive game going the distance in hurling 8 innings of 5 hit ball, walking none while recording 8 strike outs as well. The one pitch he wishes he could have back was a hanging knuckleball to Yuniesky Betancourt that he drove over the left field wall into the Sox bullpen in the 3rd inning for his 3rd homerun of the season.

“Unfortunately Bedard pitched great,” Wakefield said. “And once they got to the bullpen—Morrow and Putz—it’s pretty tough.”

In a game that only took 2 hours and 11 minutes, the Sox never really got things going offensively against the M’s pitching staff. They were only able to get two runners past first base against Bedard and their only real scoring threat in the 4th inning was killed by an inning ending double-play ball hit by Mike Lowell.

“It keeps me in rhythm. Without that defense tonight, I probably wouldn’t have made it out of the fifth inning,” Bedard said.

This outing follows up Bedard’s worst performance of the year when he allowed 9 earned runs in 4 1/3 innings against the New York Yankees last Friday in the Bronx. When asked about what adjustments he made from then to yesterday he was very frank with his response.

“Location,” was all he could muster up to interested reporters.

But he certainly had a point. He painted the outside corners of the plate with his pitches, creating problems for Red Sox hitters all night. By establishing the outside of the plate he was then able to set up his inside fastball, which jammed Sox batters and took away a lot of their powerful cuts.

“This was the game plan we talked about in spring training,” Mariners manager John McLaren said.

The Sox continue their 10 game road trip with a four game series in Baltimore. They have now lost 10 of their last 12 games away from Fenway Park and have already dropped two games to the Orioles at Camden Yards less then 2 weeks ago. The team has today off to travel and will resume play tomorrow at 7:05 EST.

Josh Beckett will take the hill against the O’s Daniel Cabrera and try to stop the hurt as much as he can. Beckett is 5-4 on the season and coming off a solid effort that resulted in a loss. He hurled 7 innings and allowed 2 runs against Oakland earlier in the road trip. Cabrera boasts a 5-1 mark and has won his last three decisions.

Sox Notes:
- The Red Sox are going to send RHP Daisuke Matsuzaka back to Boston for an MRI on his right shoulder, which the team said is “fatigued”.
- Manny Ramirez is one homerun shy of reaching the career milestone of 500. He will be the 24th player in MLB history to accomplish the feat.
- Kevin Youkilis is expected to start on Friday after sitting out the three game series in Seattle nursing a sore right hand.

It’s always nice to have the luxury of three all-stars in your starting line up but its even nicer when those all-stars combine to score 78 points in the biggest game of the year to date. Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce and Ray Allen have individually had their struggles in the 2008 playoffs but Wednesday night they put the past behind them. The ‘Big Three’ put forth one of their most impressive outings as a trio during the Boston Celtics 106-102 victory over the Detroit Pistons. The Celtics now hold a 3-2 series lead in the Eastern Conference Finals with Game 6 on the horizon in Detroit on Friday night.

“We knew the significance of this game,” said Garnett, who dropped 33 in the win, the most he’s scored in the playoffs this year. “You don’t win this game, you put basically yourself in a corner. … They’re experienced, and they’ve been in a lot of pressure situations. Now it’s up to us to go up there and try to get one.”

Ahead by as many as 17 points in the 2nd half, the Celtics looked like they would coast to victory but the stingy Pistons defense began to slowly whittle away the lead, capitalizing on turnovers and missed free throws. Leading the charge was veteran point guard Chauncey Billups who scored 26 points in the game on a 7 for 17 shooting performance in the loss.

“The good thing about it is we’re going home,” said Billups, who took the ball to the basket twice in the final 10 seconds trying to draw a foul that was never called. “We’ve been here before, and we don’t like being in this position, but we’ve fought hard.”

The shot of the night came from Allen who nailed a bucket from the deep corner of the floor right in front of the Pistons bench with less then 2 seconds remaining on the shot clock and only 1:02 left on the game clock. The basket pulled the Celtics ahead 102-99 and sent the TD Banknorth Garden crowd to their feet in jubilation. On the night Allen scored 29 points and was 5-6 from 3-point land.

“My feeling right now is no different than if I scored 10 points and we won the game. It’s a great feeling,” Allen said. “Just winning gives me the greatest joy, regardless of what I’ve done.”

Rounding out the ‘Big Three’, Pierce chipped in scoring 16 points but contributed in a big way by playing great defense on Tayshaun Prince, holding the wingman to only 8 points on the night.

Aside for the trio of all-stars, the rest of Boston’s starting 5 also played outstanding basketball. Starting PG Rajon Rondo dished out 13 assists while scoring 7 points in the win. Kendrick Perkins notched a double-double in the first half alone, actually out rebounding the entire Pistons team at the break 13 to 11. He finished the game with 18 points and 16 boards and understands the importance of winning right now.

“I know our Big Three veteran guys. I know this opportunity doesn’t come much,” Perkins said. “I knew if I was up in age, up in my 30s, and a young fellow was there I’d want him to go all-out for me, too.”

The only Celtics points not scored by a starter came from James Posey’s 3-point field goal with 9:54 left in the 4th quarter making the score at the time 89-78.

The Celtics find themselves now only one win away from returning to the NBA Finals for the first time since the 1987 season. Rondo and reserve Glen Davis were 1 year old when that last happened.

One thing is certain, if the ‘Big Three’ continue to play the way they did in Game 5, the Celtics quest for Green 17 could very well become a reality, but first they have to find a way to win one more time against Detroit before sending the team back to the NBA Finals for the first time since the original Big Three were in town.

With the Lakers up 3-1 over the Spurs, the possibility of a Celtics vs Lakers Finals is growing more likely.

Through Dice-K Matsuzaka’s first 10 starts of the 2008 season, the Boston Red Sox were a perfect 10-0 and the Japanese ace boasted an 8-0 record to lead all pitchers in the majors. Tuesday night not only did Matsuzaka not pick up the victory but the Sox fell for the first time in one of his starts, losing to the Seattle Mariners 4-3 at Safeco Field.

After pitching 4 innings and allowing 3 runs, only 2 earned, Matsuzaka came out to warm up for the 5th inning but after two warm up pitches appeared to wince and grab an area in his lower back.

“Even before I went on the mound, I felt things were a little bit off in the bullpen,” Matsuzaka said. “I wasn’t at my best. After pitching the fourth inning, I definitely felt there was something wrong, and I had a conversation with the coaching staff.”

Manager Terry Francona immediately popped out of the dugout and joined his star pitcher on the mound. After a short conversation through a translator, Francona had heard enough and called for David Aardsma from the bullpen to replace the injured starter. Matsuzaka is scheduled to pitch next on Sunday in Baltimore but is unsure if he will be able to make the start.

“We’ll certainly keep an eye on him,” Francona said. “They are going to ice it, let it cool down. … You just always have to err on the side of caution.”

The team has already been without former staff ace Curt Schilling who has been sidelined on the DL with shoulder problems all season. Recently they also lost Clay Buchholtz to the DL with a broken fingernail on his pitching hand, so losing Matsuzaka would be a huge loss at this point in the season.

When Matsuzaka left the game the Sox were trailing 3-0 and his perfect record looked to be in jeopardy.

Manny Ramirez picked up his teammate and belted a 3-run homer in the 6th inning to even the score at 3-3. The blast was Ramirez’s 499th career homerun, putting him just one shy of the 500 milestone. With his next round-tripper, he will become only the 24th player in MLB history to accomplish the feat.

The Sox bullpen held the Mariners scoreless through the 8th inning allowing only 2 hits over the 4 innings of work after Matsuzaka departed. The combination of Aardsma, Manny Delcarmen and Hideki Okajima were very effective in keeping the game tied.

Boston was able to put runners on base in the 7th, 8th and 9th innings but couldn’t advance them past first. They would strand 6 runners on base over the game and besides Ramirez’s homerun couldn’t seem to muster a clutch hit against Seattle’s pitching.

Mike Timlin came on to pitch the 9th for the Red Sox and his season struggles continued. After allowing a leadoff single to Wladimir Balentien, the M’s played some small ball having Miguel Cairo sacrifice Balentien to second base with a sac bunt. Jeremy Reed then took the ball the other way on a ground out to Dustin Pedroia at 2nd base, advancing the runner to third. Timlin intentionally walked Ichiro Suzuki to face Jose Lopez with two outs, and on a 1-2 pitch Lopez lined a single over the glove of Mike Lowell at 3rd, driving in the game winning run for a Mariners 4-3 victory. Timlin is now 2-3 on the season with a 6.89 ERA.

While the Sox continue to struggle on the road, the victory breaks a 7-game losing streak for Seattle. Boston is now 11-18 away from Fenway Park for the season.

In tonight’s rubber game of the series, Tim Wakefield will hurl against Eric Bedard at 10:10 EST. Wakefield is coming off of a rough outing allowing 8 earned runs over only 5 innings of work against Oakland on the first game of the road trip. Bedard is also coming off of his worst outing of the season where he allowed 9 earned runs over 4 1/3 innings or work against the Yankees last Friday.

Following the game the Sox will ship out to Baltimore for a four game series while the Mariners will welcome Detroit into town for a three game set.

You don’t win the MVP award in the NBA for mediocrity, you win it for having clutch performances in the games the that matter most. Welcome to the world of Kobe Bryant.

Tuesday night Bryant put on another impressive display that helped lift the Los Angeles Lakers to a 93-91 victory over the San Antonio Spurs in San Antonio. The defeat was the Spurs first loss at home during the 08′ postseason and could not have come at a worse time. The defending NBA Champions now find themselves trailing the series 3-1 and heading back into enemy territory, facing a must win situation.

Bryant dropped 28 points and grabbed 10 boards in the game that put the LA only 1 win away from returning to the NBA Finals for the first time since 2004.

“It is a big step for us,” said Bryant. “Tonight we came out and did a much, much better job to win in this building in this particular game. It’s big for us.”

Up two points with 2 seconds left the Lakers were in situation that called for one more stop to secure the victory. Coming out of a time out, the Spurs ran Brent Barry off of a double screen for the game’s final shot. Barry’s 3-point attempt to win the game did not connect, many believed that he was also fouled in the last ditch effort to pick up the victory.

“That’s not going to get called in the Western Conference finals,” Barry said. “Maybe in the regular season. But that call shouldn’t be called in the Western Conference finals.”

Tim Duncan led all scorers with 29 points while hammering down 17 rebounds but it was not enough to overcome the reigning MVP.

“Obviously we’re in a hole and it’s 3-1,” Duncan said. “It’s one loss and an elimination, but we really feel that if we clean a lot of this stuff up we have an opportunity to get right back in this series.”

Tony Parker and Barry both added 23 points a piece for the Spurs but throughout the game it was the Lakers lineup of youngsters that out hustled and out worked the veterans that just last season tasted what it was like to be crowned NBA Champions.

“I told them at the end of the ballgame, their energy was terrific,” Lakers coach Phil Jackson said. “Coming out and responding to a loss and getting a lead … and playing with that kind of energy, I think, carried us over and we responded every time that they came in, tied the ballgame.”

One statistic that San Antonio head coach Greg Popovich and the rest of the Spurs lineup can not be happy about is their rebounding effort as a team. They were out rebounded 46-37 on the night which led to 26 second chance points by the Lakers compared to only 4 for the Spurs. That can not happen again in LA if they expect to pull off a victory.

Game 5 will be on Thursday night at 9pm. The Spurs will look to extend the series at least another game so they can play Game 6 in front of their home crowd, while LA is looking to wrap things up in their own backyard.

One thing is certain; Kobe is going to continue to put up MVP numbers because that’s what MVP’s do. It’s now up to the Spurs to shut down the rest of the Lakers club to keep their hopes of repeating as champions alive.

Lakers vs Spurs Tickets available for all remaining games. Tickets also available for potential Lakers vs Celtics or Lakers vs Pistons NBA Finals.

They call it Friendly Fenway for a reason. The Boston Red Sox haven’t had any problem winning at home this season; their troubles have just been everywhere else. Victories on the road have been hard to come by for this years’ club but they managed to find a way to win last night, beating the Seattle Mariners 5-3 at Safeco Field.

Bartolo Colon pitched 7 strong innings allowing only 1 run on 5 hits while striking out 5 Mariners batters. His fastball topped 97mph on the radar gun and the former Cy Young Award winner looked to be back in old form. Now all the veteran needs to do is lose 30 lbs and it will be the Colon of old.

Manager Terry Francona was impressed by Colon’s second outing since being called up from Triple-A Pawtucket to take Clay Buchholtz’s roster spot. Buchholtz continues to nurse a broken fingernail on his pitching hand while rehabbing in the Sox farm system.

“I thought his movement, his life on his fastball was good and he got strong,” Francona said. “He made a lot of good quality pitches with life.”

Colon out pitched Felix Hernandez, who in the past, had owned Red Sox hitters. The 22nd year old one-hit the Sox last season at Fenway and while Sox hitters had not forgotten the stellar performance, they still knew that the young fireballer was beatable.

“We hit the ball really hard early in the game and they made some great plays. When he pitched against us last year, we didn’t hit any balls hard,” Red Sox 2B Dustin Pedroia said.

David Ortiz got things going for the Sox in the 4th inning by blasting his 12th homerun of the season over the centerfield fence. After Seattle tied the game in the 6th on an RBI groundout by Raul Ibanez that plated Ichiro Suzuki, Colon pitched his way out of the inning to keep the game knotted at 1-1.

The Sox would do all the damage they would need in the top of the 7th, plating 4 runs on 5 hits all with 2 outs. Pedroia, Manny Ramirez and Mike Lowell would all connect on RBI hits while Jason Varitek walked with the bases loaded to drive in Boston’s final run on the night.

“With him [Hernandez] you’re just trying to get a pitch out over the plate to hit,” Pedroia said. “You don’t get many so you’ve got to make sure you hit them.”

Hideki Okajima relieved Colon and pitched a scoreless 8th inning, lowering his season ERA to 0.86. Jonathan Papelbon came on in the 9th to close the door and recorded the final 3 outs. He allowed two unearned runs but was able to record 2 strike outs in his inning of work.

Before the win, the Sox had lost their previous 7 road games but look to build off the effort for the rest of the road trip. They are now 11-17 on the road for the year.

Tonight, Dice-K Matsuzaka puts his perfect 8-0 record on the line against Seattle’s Miguel Batista. Batista sports a 3-6 record on the year with a 6.47 ERA while Matsuzaka remains unbeaten with a 2.25 ERA. With tonight’s outing, Matsuzaka will attempt to match Josh Becket’s 9-0 start of the 2007 season.

“I’m very grateful that I’ve been given the chance to get these wins under these circumstances,” Matsuzaka said through a translator.

Against Seattle in 2007, Matsuzaka was 1-1 with a 4.33 ERA. He dominated fellow Japanese star Ichiro Suzuki. The Seattle right fielder was only 1-for-12 with 2 walks and 3 strikeouts versus Matsuzaka.

First pitch of tonight’s game will be at 10:10 EST.

The numbers don’t lie, the Boston Celtics shooting performance in Monday night’s 94-75 loss to the Detroit Pistons in Game 4 of the Eastern Conference Finals was awful, and that might even be giving them too much credit.

As a team, Boston was a pathetic 21 of 66 from the floor for a .318 shooting percentage on the night. Of those 21 field goals, 11 were either dunks or layups which means that as a team they shot even worse from outside the paint (10-55 for a .182 shooting percentage). Those numbers are reminiscent of a middle school girl’s rec. basketball game, and unfortunately for the C’s that’s exactly how they played.

“We didn’t play well, but we hung in there by getting to the foul line,” Celtics coach Doc Rivers said. “Then, we just couldn’t make plays.”

If it weren’t for the charity stripe, this game could have been one of the biggest playoff blow outs in years. The Celtics we fortunate enough to get to the line 39 times during the night and connected on 32 of those attempts. Other then that, there wasn’t much happening for the team that finished the regular season with the NBA best record.

“They bumped us off spots and were more physical and aggressive all night,” Rivers said. “Usually the winner is the team that was more aggressive. They had a no-layup rule and that’s why we made it to the line so much.”
Before the first TV timeout, the Celtics were already trailing by double digits as the Pistons jumped ahead early scoring the games first 10 points in under 3 minutes. After the early run, Boston was forced to claw back but strong offensive nights by Rip Hamilton (20) and Antonio McDyess (21) were too much to overcome down the stretch.

“You only have so many opportunities, and they’re limited, especially for me,” McDyess said. “I’m at the end of my career, and I just feel like leaving everything out on the floor.” His teammates have recognized that he’s playing with the passion and desire to win like never before. McDyess was not part of the Pistons championship team in 2004 and wants so badly to be a contributing member of a team that can win it all.

“Dice has been our best player in the postseason, and we’re all feeding off his energy,” teammate and close friend Chauncey Billups said who scored 10 points on the game. “You see how hard he is working, and you can’t help but play hard.”

On the other end of the court, the Celtics Big Three struggled from the floor all night long. Paul Pierce, Ray Allen and Kevin Garnett combined to go 11 for 38 from the field, the trio’s worst performance together in the playoffs. Pierce and Garnett each scored 16 points and Allen netted 11 but none of them were ever able to get it going and catch fire from the field.

“We pride ourselves on making our teammates better and allowing them to make us better,” Allen said.

Allen had been going through a large shooting slump entering the series but after an impressive Game 2 shooting performance, many believed he’d be able to turn in back on for the remainder of the Conference Finals. He’s averaging just less than 15 points a game for the series but still looks a little gun shy behind the arc.

As the series shifts back to Boston for Game 5, the attention of many will refocus on the Celtics defending their home court as they had done so well for the first 9 games on the playoffs. Detroit handed them their first defeat of the postseason at home in Game 2 last Thursday, but now the Celtics look to rebound for another win in front of the Boston crowds.

Boston has not lost back-to-back home games since mid March when they fell to Utah before going on the Texas road trip where they beat the Spurs, Rockets and Mavericks only to return home and fall to Philadelphia in their first game back.

For the Celtics to win this series they need to not repeat the shooting performance, or lack there of, from last nights game. This team is just full of too many talented players to be shooting anywhere under .400 percent from the floor every game. They need to go back to the tapes from Games 1 and 3 and realize that making the extra pass on the offensive end works. It tires the defense and creates better looks at the hoop for more players.

This Detroit team is very beatable. The Celtics just need to forget about their Game 4 display and get ready to defend their home court advantage once again on Wednesday. With the series knotted at 2-2, it now becomes a best of 3 match up, and if the Celtics can just manage to win at home, they will be heading to the NBA Finals for the first time since 1987.

Celtics vs Pistons Tickets are still available for Game 5!

The combination of early goals and stellar defense has been the key and just enough for the Detroit Red Wings to capture victories over the Pittsburgh Penguins in Games 1 and 2 of the Stanley Cup Finals.

Monday night, Chris Osgood made 22 saves for his second shutout in as many games to propel the Red Wings half way home to winning their 11th Stanley Cup. Their last Championship season came in 2002 but they are two wins away from capturing the title again. The shutout was Osgood’s 13th playoff shutout of his career.

“I play the game as it comes,” Osgood said. “I love playing behind these guys. I don’t need 40 shots to play the game or to feel good. I’m confident regardless. I’m not really into stats too much, just into winning.”

Brad Stuart scored the Wings first goal 6:55 into the first period and Thomas Holmstrom netted the games second goal 11:18 into the same frame. This was Holmstrom’s 4th goal of the playoffs and gave his defense a little breathing room, not that they really needed it.

This Penguins offensive unit that scored 247 goals during the regular season has now been held scoreless for 6 consecutive periods. Captain Sidney Crosby hopes that things can change when the series shifts to Pittsburgh for Games 3 and 4.

“We just have to execute,” Penguins captain Sidney Crosby said. “Did they really get that many scoring chances on us? I don’t think they did. They got a few and put them in. We hit a post, and pucks go through us by the net that we don’t put in. That’s the difference.”

The series continues Wednesday night at 8:00 pm in Pittsburgh.

It had been almost 2 months since the Boston Celtics suffered a loss on their home court. Thursday night, the Detroit Pistons reminded them just what it felt like; by beating the C’s 103-97 in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference Finals match up at the TD Banknorth Garden.

The loss snapped a 9-game playoff win streak at home and a 15-game win streak dating back to the regular season. Their last loss at the Garden came at the hands of the Philadelphia 76ers on March 24th. Head coach Doc Rivers knows that his team will have to capture at least one victory on the road now to advance to the NBA Finals.

“I fully believe, and I’ve said many times, at some point we’re going to have to win on the road,” Rivers said. “We’ve gotten away with it thus far. That’s been taken away. And if we want what we want, we have to win on the road and that’s just the way it is.”

Boston’s Big Three did all that they could to try and pull off the win but got very little support from the rest of the line-up which ultimately cost them the game. Paul Pierce (26), Kevin Garnett (24) and Ray Allen (25) accounted for 75 of the teams 97 points. The Pistons used a balanced offensive attack with six players scoring in double figures including all of the starting five.

“It is even,” Pistons forward Rasheed Wallace said. “We don’t sit back and say, ‘Oh, look. They are undefeated at home,’ or ‘They didn’t win a game on the road.’ … A lot of the teams they played in the postseason and the regular season were scared of them, as far as KG and Ray and Paul. They are good players, but we have good players, also.”

Unlike Game 1, last night’s tempo was much more upbeat and both teams tried to run the ball and transition for fast break points. The Pistons did this more effectively behind the reigns of veteran PG Chauncey Billups who finished with 19 points and 7 assists. Teammate Richard Hamilton (25 points, 4 assists) wanted to make sure Billups was in the right state of mind for Game 2 after a sub par performance in the series opener.

“One thing I told Chaunce, you ain’t got to be overaggressive out there,” Hamilton said. “You can take your time and be the captain of our ship, and we’ll try to do a good job of helping you out.”

As the series now shifts to Detroit, the big question that everyone’s asking is can the Celtics win on the road? During the regular season they had no trouble away from Boston and actually had the NBA’s best road record. Since then it’s been a different story. The C’s are 0-6 away from home during the 2008 playoffs, and now will be forced to take at least one game on the road from the Pistons to win the series.

The first thing that needs to occur for them to be successful away from Boston is they need more production and better minutes from their bench. Guys like James Posey, Eddie House and Leon Powe need to step it up. All three of those guys are very capable of dropping 8-12 points a game. Last night the three combined for only 3 points on a Posey 3-point FG.

A great sign for the Celtics was seeing Allen find his shooting touch again after a prolonged slump that last over 3 weeks. He needs to continue to feel it from behind the arc so that the Pistons are forced to pull defenders from the middle to cover him on the perimeter, which will then open up the paint for guys like KG and Kendrick Perkins.

Another key to winning on the road for the Celtics will be to maintain their composure. Calls aren’t going to be going their way, the crowd will be loud and it can get intimidating but it’s very important for them to stay focused. The Pistons are going to be fired up and the Celtics will need to match that intensity.

“The atmosphere’s going to be crazy,” Hamilton said. “We’re geeked about getting back to our home court. The fans are excited, and now it’s our job to take care of home court.”

It is now the Celtics turn to play the role of the spoiler as they hope to take one if not both of the games in Detroit over the holiday weekend. The Big Three needs to continue to dominate and can only hope that the rest of their teammates pick up the slack a bit from their output in Game 2.

“We have no choice now but to get it done on the road,” Pierce said.

They did it all during the regular season and the time has come where they will now have to find a way to do it again. Their quest for Green 17 continues, next stop Detroit City.