Latest Sports Links

On the Toronto Raptors...they lost in Minneapolis to the Minnesota Timberwolves to extend their current losing streak to 11 games. The final score was 103-94. Here's the link: Toronto Eaten by Wolves They play tonight in Indianapolis vs the Pacers to try and end the streak. Game time is at 7 PM on Sportsnet.

On the London Knights...on Thursday, they travelled to Niagara to take on the IceDogs. It was a wild game, ending at 6-6 at the end of regulation. Overtime solved nothing, but the Knights won in a shootout. The final score was 7-6. Here's the link. Then the Knights hosted the Erie Otters on Friday and lost 6-4. SCORE Finally, on Sunday, the Knights went to Brampton to play against the Battalion and were victorious in a 4-2 game. STATS Their next game is Friday vs the Kingston Frontenacs in Kingston, Ontario. The game starts at 7:30 PM.

That's all for now. I'll see you later.

Raptors Burned by Miami's Heat, Knights News

On Saturday, the Toronto Raptors went into Miami to play against the Heat to try and stop their 6-game winning streak. Well, I'm sorry to say that it didn't happen, as Miami went up by 26 points by halftime. Oh, the Raptors did try to get back into it in the 2nd half, cutting the lead to 7 points late in the 4th quarter. The comeback was so fierce that I honestly thought the Raps were going to pull it off. Miami, however, kept right on making three-point baskets and the game was over after that. Miami made 16 in all! I was disappointed immensely with this loss, because the loss wasted a great comeback attempt by a injured Raptors team that is WAY DOWN in the standings right now. Anyways, here's the recap: Heat Too Much for Raptors

Also too, here are your latest London Knights links:
Knights vs Greyhounds, Jan 20, 2011
Knights vs Petes, Jan 21, 2011
Knights vs Generals, Jan 23, 2011

Those Knights games were ALL victories, with the one vs the Oshawa Generals ending in a 6-5 shootout win for London! Tonight meanwhile, the Raptors take on the Memphis Grizzlies at the Air Canada Centre in Toronto. The game is at 7 PM on TSN. Goodbye, everyone!

Raptors Eaten by Orlando's Magic

Last night, Toronto played vs Orlando on the road and played a decent first-half, getting the deficit to 6 by halftime. Dwight Howard and a TERRIBLE second half however, proved disastrous for the Raptors who ended up being blown out by 40 points, 112-72! It was terrible, so terrible that I will just link to a recap. Enjoy and get ready for tonight's game in Miami vs the Heat. The game is on TSN2 at 7 PM. LeBron James is back for Miami after a 4-game Heat losing streak, but Bosh still has a sprained ankle and won't go tonight. Here's the recap: 40-Point Blowout Loss for Raptors Have a good one, folks and goodbye.

For the First Time Ever...a 5-topic Blog Post!

Yes, that's right folks! A five-topic post, and it's 8 AM in the morning when I'm starting to post it! First off, we have an interesting news story about the Miami Heat's biggest star: LeBron James. It appears that he has been making ill-advised comments on his Twitter page, much the same way that Chris Bosh had before he bolted out of Toronto for the aforementioned Heat. On Fanhouse's NBA section, there is currently an article entitled "The Works: LeBron James Does Battle with Himself". According to the article, LeBron tweeted about the January 11th loss by the Cleveland Cavaliers to the Los Angeles Lakers by saying that it was crazy how "karma" works, it gets you every time, it's not good to wish bad on anybody, etc. LeBron even meaninglessly brought God's name into the picture as well. At that moment, people were chiding LeBron - rightly so in my opinion - about kicking a team when they're down and rubbing it in. However, the article attempts to defend LeBron by pointing out that the reaction is "justified" by Dan Gilbert's famous letter that he wrote to Cavs fans about the infamous "Decision" special that ESPN hosted about LeBron going to Miami. Mr. Gilbert's reaction may have been childish, but after the special happened, I really can't blame him. To brazenly go on TV and "announce" to everyone what they already knew is also childish and self-serving. You can't excuse your own failures by pointing the blame at others; you are responsible for whatever you do. However, the rest of the article recovers from that liberal claptrap piece by putting the blame on LeBron for his ill-advised comments and seemed to suggest that the actions themselves put LeBron at odds with the NBA public and that his damage control assertions about not wishing to offend anyone and "offering advice" to a friend are incredibly poor and seem to be just lies. To all of that, I say AMEN! To read the article, click here.

Next up, we must address the atrocious arguments of a tough and prominent Youtube atheist by the name of Dhorpatan. He claims to be an "objectivist" meaning that he wants to base his views on facts and not on anything subjective such as emotions. It also refers to the founder of this worldview whose name was Ayn Rand. In his recent video entitled "His Name was not Jesus Christ" Dhorpatan discusses the fact that Christ's name actually isn't Jesus Christ but rather Yeshua which is the Hebrew and therefore the truest name for the Saviour. I have a few problems with his video. First, the manner in which he presents the video is one of shock, surprise, and an attitude of "Ooh gee, this is DEFINITELY going to send the Christians into panic mode and this will destroy their religion. I have disproved Christianity for good. I found something that they don't know about," etc. Never mind the fact that there ARE Christians who know about this such as myself and who can give a reasonable explanation for such facts. Second, Dhorpatan goes beyond stating the fact about Christ's Hebrew name and goes on to imply that language changes of Christ's name indicate corruption of the Bible and of Christ himself and that English people are responsible for the said corruptions! This is simply ludicrous reasoning since no language translates perfectly. It isn't the language that corrupts a document, but rather the fact of whether the teachings, concepts and ideas of the author are preserved faithfully in whatever language the material is translated in. Got Questions Ministries, an online-based Christian apologetics and resource website, has a very good explanation which you can read here. The gist of the article is that Yeshua is the Hebrew name for Jesus while the English spelling is Joshua. Our Jesus name comes from English translations of Greek New Testament manuscripts, since the New Testament was written originally in ancient Koine Greek. The name is a transliteration from the Koine Greek to English. In other words, the name was changed according to language and related needs. The Hebrew Yeshua was changed to the Greek Iesous and this is how we get the name "Jesus". So, it's not an exact translation but this is what happens when you need to change from one language to another. As I said, no language does a perfect job. If Dhorpatan knew these facts, he wouldn't come off as ignorantly as he does in the video. To see the video, click here.

Next up, some sad Raptors news to report. Last night, they played in San Antonio vs the Spurs. Toronto had a double-digit halftime lead but failed to hold onto the lead and blew up in the 3rd quarter. They eventually lost the game 105-94. I didn't watch the game last night because I was watching the CHL Top Prospects game on Rogers Sportsnet. It only comes on once a year, so I figured, "Nothing to it...I'll just watch this hockey game and see if I enjoy it." Anyways, here's the recap.

Now, onto that Top Prospects game I mentioned...it was on last night on Sportsnet and it took place in Toronto at the Air Canada Centre. This is an annual junior hockey event that pits the players most projected to be drafted against each other in a hockey game. This game is for NHL general managers to guage talent and see how well the players play as this will help them determine their draft choices for their NHL clubs. The team names in this contest are Team Cherry and Team Orr because the head coaches for the teams are usually Don Cherry of CBC television Hockey Night in Canada fame and Boby Orr of NHL legend fame. This year, Don took his usual coaching spot behind the bench for his Team Cherry group, while Team Orr was coached this year by Doug Gilmour, another famous NHL legend who once played for the Toronto Maple Leafs. Anyways, about the game...Team Orr defeated Team Cherry 7-1 in a 3rd period blowout where the Orr team scored 4 unanswered goals in that frame to put the game away. It all started around halfway through the first period when Team Cherry was on the power play. Daniel Catenacci scored on a short-handed breakaway during the power play to put the Orr team up 1-0. At that time, it was only the 3rd shot on goal for team Orr. Catenacci plays for the OHL's Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds during the regular junior hockey season. The MVP of the game for Team Orr was WHL's Red Deer Rebels player Ryan Nugent-Hopkins who collected two assists in the game. The only goal scorer for Team Cherry was OHL's Shane Prince of the Ottawa 67's. Two London Knights played in the game: Vladislav Namestnikov of the winning Orr team and Scott Harrington of the losing Cherry team. Harrington picked up an assist on the Shane Prince goal for Team Cherry. Here's the recap.

Lastly, I need to rant about the newest version of Windows Media Player (Windows Media Player 12). Before I start with my negatives, some positives are in order. The Player is now located conveniently on the bottom of the computer screen for easy access. Also too, the Play, Burn, and Sync options are easily located in the top-right corner in the main Player album screen. The music and audio files play quicker than they did on the previous version of the Player (Windows Media Player 11) which is also a nice plus. However, that is where the positives pretty much end for me. The negatives are:
1. There is no Color Chooser (the option that let you change the colour of the actual player from blue to green to red, etc.) This option is absent in the newest Player version.
2. Whenever I try to manually change the album art for any album in the Player library, a message pops up stating that I cannot change album art for an album that is in use (has a song playing). However, I am NEVER playing songs when I try to change the art. When I try to save the album art that I see online to the appropriate artist folder, it does change either the mp3 or the album art temporarily, but whenever I restart the computer or the Player, the changes are no longer in effect. This also happens for the copy and paste album art method of manually changing album art.
3. Whenever I start or restart the Player, the Player has to put the albums BACK onto the Player library and it also keeps "updating" the library and my music folders, all of which takes an EXTREMELY long time to finish - about 30 mins to 1 or 2 hours because I have a lot of music and audio files in the Player library. The same things happen whenever I restart the computer as well.
4. The Burn option is a complete ripoff because the Player help manual indicates that I should be able to burn up to 80 minutes to a regular blank audio disc. However, when I have tried to do this, the Player indicates that I have to put the remaining audio content on a SECOND disc! It turns out that I am only allowed to burn up to 72-73 minutes onto a single blank disc instead of the 80 I was SUPPOSED to be able to burn! The SAME problem existed in the previous version of the Player as well. I'm not sure if it's the discs themselves or the burner, but this really makes me angry sometimes.

Well, that's about it. Hope you enjoyed this whopper of a long posting. I'll see you later!

Catching up on the Knights and Raptors

As promised, I will recap that Knights game vs the Niagara IceDogs now. It happened on Friday in London at the John Labatt Centre where the Knights were victorious in a shootout, 2-1. Niagara's regulation goal came first in the 2nd period courtesy of Freddie Hamilton. Dougie Hamilton and Alex Friesen received the assists. London's goal came in the 3rd period from Vladislav Namestnikov with assists by Seth Griffith and Stephen Sanza. This made it 1-1 after the regulation 3 periods. Overtime solved nothing, so we went to a shootout. In that shootout, Niagara's only goal came from Ryan Strome. Namestnikov scored again for London but the winner for the Knights was scored by Ryan Rupert. A point of interest for the game is that the goaltenders for the best two teams in this year's World Junior Hockey Championships faced off against each other. Mark Visentin was in net for Niagara while Igor Bobkov was in net for London. Mark had ended up being the main goalie for Canada at the World Juniors while Igor had ended up in that same role for Russia at the Juniors, who had beat Canada in that gold medal game. The shots on goal favoured the Knights 37-29. Click here for the game recap.

On Saturday the Knights played in Erie against the Otters and lost 5-2. Here's the info. They now don't play until Thursday when they host the Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds at the JLC. Start time is 7 PM.

Onto the Raptors...they lost heartbreakers vs the Pistons at home in Toronto and vs the Wizards in Washington on the road. Here's the game link vs the Pistons. Here also is the game link vs the Wizards. The fianl scores for both games were: Pistons 101, Raptors 95 and Wizards 98, Raptors 95. Toronto now travels to New Orleans to take on the Hornets TODAY at 3 PM on Rogers Sportsnet One.

That's it. I will now sign off, and goodbye.  

Apologies for no Blog Postings, Raptors and Knights Roster Moves

I realize that it's been awhile since I last blogged, but I wasn't able to access the Internet. When I returned home on Wednesday afternoon after my chiropractic appointment, my mother and I were STUNNED to learn that our telephone and Internet services were completely unavailable; they couldn't work! It turned out that the phone malfunctioning was due to a bad wire in the line outside. As for the Internet, well we still don't know what happened, but it's working now. We had to contact Bell Sympatico for assistance on the issue and they proved to be very helpful. So, if you're wondering why there were no posts about the Raptors tough loss to the Atlanta Hawks, now you have the reason. So I will be content to just simply update you on some roster moves that the Knights and Raptors have both made. Starting with the Raptors...on Thursday the team had announced that they have signed a 6 foot 1 inch point guard named Sundiata Gaines to a 10-day contract to make up for the departure of Ronald Dupree. Gaines has previously played for the Los Angeles Clippers and the Minnesota Timberwolves, both of which are doing even worse than the Raptors. Here's the story.  Now, finally, onto the London Knights...general manager Mark Hunter didn't feel as though the Knights would have a shot at going deep into the playoffs and contending for an OHL championship this year, so he traded away a lot of veterans in exchange for draft picks to gear up for the future. The trades were:
- Michael D'Orazio to Mississauga St. Michael's Majors for some Majors draft picks: their 2015 2nd draft pick, their 2nd round pick in 2016 and their 2nd round pick in 2017
- Tyler Brown to Kingston Frontenacs for some Kingston draft picks: 4th round pick in 2012 and an 8th round pick in 2011
- Chris DeSouza to Mississauga St. Michael's Majors for some Majors draft picks: 2nd round draft pick in 2013 and 4th round pick in 2013
- Victor Terreri to Niagara IceDogs for Niagara draft picks: 5th round draft pick in 2011 and 8th round draft pick in 2012
- gave up a 7th round draft pick in 2012 to the Belleville Bulls for a roster spot: Kyle DeCoste
Here's the trade information. 

Well, that's it. All that's left for me now is to remind you that the Knights play tonight at home in the John Labatt Centre vs the aforementioned Niagara IceDogs. The game will start at 7:30 PM and can be heard on the AM 1290 CJBK radio station if you get it. If not, just try to listen online at the Knights website. If that doesn't even work, then just wait until I recap it. As for the Raptors, they play tonight as well. They will host the Detroit Pistons in Toronto at the Air Canada Centre and the game will start at 7 PM on TSN. Until next time, keep on cheering!

Getting Back to Normal

Now that the dust from the World Junior Hockey Championships has cleared, it's back to normal for this blog: Raptors and Knights updates. To start off, I'll take you back to the Raptors game vs the Sacramento Kings that occurred on Sunday afternoon. Toronto started off by hitting their FIRST TEN shots!!! I couldn't believe it as I was watching it. As the shots were being made, I kept saying to myself, "They STILL haven't missed any yet!" Eventually their shooting percentage slid down to normal and I could focus on the actual game. There wasn't a whole lot of defense however, so it was a close game all the way to the end. The turning point of the game was when Kings' DeMarcus Cousins scored 6 points for Sacramento during a 7-2 run that pulled the Kings to within 110-109 with a minute left to play. Andrea Bargnani however, scored a big 3-pointer that sealed the win for the Raptors. The final score was 118-112 for Toronto. The game stars were starting shooting guard DeMar DeRozan and starting centre Andrea Bargnani. The two combined for 58 points, 11 rebounds, and 7 assists and shot 25-39 from the floor. They were especially huge in the 4th quarter for the Raptors when DeMar came up with big shots as well as Andrea, not to mention Andrea's huge game-sealing three-pointer. The Raptors' bench star was shooting guard Leandro Barbosa. He scored 18 crucial points for Toronto, shooting 7-11 and making 3 3-pointers. In the 4th quarter, the "Brazilian Blur" shined the brightest, scoring 11 points and grabbing a big rebound with the Raps holding a 4-point lead with only 43 seconds left in the game. For the whole game, Barbosa collected 5 rebounds. Finally, some stats from the game before I close it all out:
- Toronto scored 64 points in the paint, which is a season-high.
- The win vs Sacramento marks the 3rd straight game that the Raptors have shot 50% or better from the floor, which is also a season-high.
- This game is the 4th game this season where Andrea Bargnani has scored at least 30 points.
- The Kings in the game had a 30-19 advantage on fast break points.
- The Kings scored 20 points off of 16 Raptors turnovers.
Here's the game recap.

Well, that wraps up another blog post! Join me next time as I recap the Raptors next game which will take place on Wednesday vs the Atlanta Hawks. The game starts at 7 PM on TSN2. Until then, you all take care and peace be with you!

Team Canada Hockey Rant

Wow...what a shocker! For those of you who don't know, Team Canada played their gold medal game last night in the World Junior Hockey Championships vs Russia. The game started off great for Canada, scoring the game's first 3 goals and being  up 3-0 after 2 periods. The goals were scored by Ryan Ellis, Carter Ashton, and Brayden Schenn. Then...the unexpected happened: Russia started a come-back. The Russians would go on to score 5 unanswered goals in the 3rd period to win the game, 5-3 and hand the Canadians their 2nd straight silver medal year. How could that happen? It happened because Canada stopped being physical with the clean hitting and good forechecking and they didn't use their size on the boards to their advantage to generate offence. Their game of cycling the puck was gone as well. It was almost as if Canada thought,"We're up 3 goals. That's enough offence. Let's sit back and try to skate with the Russians and keep them off the scoring sheet." That's honestly what it looked like to me as I watched the game. The Russians, of course, took advantage and downed the Canadians for their 1st gold medal since 2003 when they defeated Canada in THAT gold medal game. I am both shocked and angry today: shocked because of how Russia was able to come back and win the game the way that they did, and angry because of what Team Canada did in the 3rd period. Also too, the attitude of the fans has made me very upset as well throughout the tournament. Canadians overall are arrogant and vain when it comes to hockey: we think that it's "our" game and that we always have the best players. Shut up with that attitude! This is EXACTLY why our teams are not winners right now. We need to be humble and remember that any team can win on any night. I saw FAN-MADE SIGNS that reflected these proud notions on TV. As a result of our back-to-back silver performances, our team has now been relegated to the B pool for next year's tournament, which will be co-hosted in Calgary and Edmonton. Let's hope that our arrogance will disappear for good, because it needs to. Oh, and another thing: you Russians also need to be ashamed of yourselves after getting kicked off your plane for the return flight to your country! I know you won against us, but that is NO excuse for carrying on like children! Show some decency and conduct yourselves as professionals. For more on that story, click here. For the game recap, go here. You Russians are just as bad as Sweden was when they defeated Canada in the round-robin portion of the tournament. For the rest of us...let's hope Hockey Canada gets their heads together and comes out next year with a superb roster. Join me next time as we get back to normal with Raptors and Knights coverage. Until then, stay warm everyone!

Canada Romps all over the Americans in Win

Wow, what a game and what a scene! I'll never forget it: Canada playing in a U.S. rink against the supposedly host nation, and the mast majority of the fans in last night's semi-final game were CANADIAN! I don't thnk this has EVER happened in sports! It may never happen again, to be sure, and the Canadian juniors made the most of it: hitting the Americans aggressively and rolling to a 4-1 win behind good goaltending by Mark Visentin, who was supposed to be the backup behind Ollivier Roy. To give you a sense as to how Canada dominated the stands though, let me give you some numbers: the HSBC Arena holds approximately 19,000 seats. Canadians accounted for a stunning 12,000 of those! This reflects on the love that Canadians have gradually stoked for this tournament and the overall craze the nation has for hockey period. It also reflects poorly on American love and involvement for the game of hockey. Back to the game...Curtis Hamilton, Quinton Howden, Ryan Johansen and Zack Kassien scored the goals for Canada while Chris Brown scored the only goal for the U.S. Canada truly controlled the game from start to finish, repeatedly testing starting American goaltender Jack Campbell and totally outshooting the opposition. Canada outshot the Americans 41-22. As a result of their good performances, both goaltenders were named as the players of the game for their teams. One last note about this great game: Curtis Hamilton started the party in the 1st period with his goal. Now, Canada gets to play Russia in the gold medal game on Wednesday at 7 PM on TSN. This after Russia knocked off Finland in a come-from-behind victory in the quarter-finals and Sweden in their semi-finals. Of course, Sweden again showed no class after their loss to Russia, with the goaltender uttering a curse word in his fury. What had happened was this: the puck was shot down the ice by Russia, and it went all the way down to the other end of the rink. The Swedish goalie Robin Lehner supposed it to be icing and when it was later waved off, the Russians took advantage and scored a key goal. So, while Lehner was right to be angry about the non-call, his manner of reaction was uncalled for. As a result, Sweden and the U.S. will play for bronze on Wednesday afternoon, and the Canadians and Russians will go for gold later that night. So, tune in to the Canada-Russia game and cheer on our boys. Here's the recap for the game vs America: Goodbye, U.S.; Hello, Russia! Here also is the recap for the Sweden-Russia semi-final game: Russia Defeats Sweden in Shootout See you later, everybody! 

Canadian Juniors Rebound to Knock Off Swiss

As a result of the shootout loss vs Sweden, Canada had to play Switzerland yesterday in order to see who would advance to today's semifinals. Canada, however, had to overcome a bad start courtesy of backup goaltender Mark Visentin who let in a soft goal by Inti Pestoni of the Swiss to make it 1-0 Switzerland just 1:09 into the game. With that goal and the hot goaltending by Swiss starter Benjamin Conz who stopped 46 Canadian shots, the Canadians looked horrific and it seemed as though their quest for victory was over. However, Canada would solve Conz eventually, scoring their first goal on what the TSN website called "a late first period power-play" from Ryan Johanesen. The score stayed that way until Casey Cizikas scored on a 2-on-1 break in the 2nd period. Casey held the puck and then shot it over-top of the hot Conz for his goal. Watching it on TV made the goal look slow-motion in terms of development. Louis LeBlanc scored again for Canada early on in the 3rd period for an insurance goal. Finally, the previously suspended Zack Kassian, who looked timid all afternoon as a result, scored an empty-net goal to put it away for Canada and make the score a 4-1 final. Canada will now face the U.S. TONIGHT at 7 PM on TSN in their semi-final match. The winner goes for gold in the gold-medal game while the loser will play in the bronze-medal game later on. One final game note: Canada out-shot Switzerland 50-22, a testament to the Canadians offence and resiliency and a lack of offence for the Swiss. Well, that about wraps it up. Tune in tonight for the semi-final match, and I will echo what the Canadian fans were chanting yesterday at the end of the quarter-final match vs Switzerland, "BRING ON THE U.S.A.!" Here is the game recap: Swiss Defeated; Americans Await 

Our Canadian Arrogance: Smashed by Classless Sweden

There comes a time when your "superiority" must be tested, and if need be, destroyed. For the Canadian world juniors, that time came last night on New Years Eve vs Sweden. This game was a heartbreaker of a loss, with the Swedes winning 6-5 in a shootout. In that shootout, NONE of the Canadian shooters could score any goals. Ryan Ellis and Brayden Schenn were among the shooters in the deciding shootout for Canada. In the regular portion of the game, there were 5 lead changes, with Sean Courturier giving Canada the game's first goal and whipping up the Canadian crowd in Buffalo, New York. The scoring, however, was fast and furious throughout portions of the game, with Max Friberg of Sweden tieing it up soon after at 1-1. The Canadian goaltender was starter Ollivier Roy, and he once again looked amateurish on the ice, missing key save opportunities early on that could have given team Canada the win. The second and thrid Swedish goals especially exemplify that point most accurately. Needless to say, Swedish goaltender Robin Lehner was off his game as well, also letting in 5 goals in the regular 3 periods. Other Canadian contributers were Quintin Howden, Curtis Hamilton with 2 goals, and Brayden Schenn (who was visibly upset after missing a key scoring opportunity later on in the shootout). After the game-winning goal was scored by Sweden in the shootout, I was notably upset myself with both the goaltending of Ollivier Roy for Canada and the post-game reaction of Sweden: jumping up and down, hugging each other, and generally acting as though they had won the whole tournament. Bunch of sore, pathetic winners! If you had been in my family home's living room, you would have seen and heard me scream the following words at the TV screen, "Yeah, why the poor sportsmanship, huh? You're all poor sports! Bunch of jerks!" However, there are two good things that came out of this tragedy: Zach Kassien's suspension is done, and the arrogant pride of the Canadian fans was smashed to bits with the defeat. As a result of this loss, Canada will now have to play in the extra quarter-final game vs Switzerland on Sunday. The game will start at 3 PM on TSN. Let's hope that the coach for Canada does the right thing and goes with backup Mark Visentin the rest of the way in the tournament! Until Sunday, have a good night! Here's the recap: Canada Bounced by Swedes