The Square Life

Wow. What a difference home court makes! So, I spent this past weekend down in St. George with my wife for our anniversary. For those of you single sports nuts out there, I can't tell you how important it is to marry somebody who is willing to TRY to understand your addiction. My wife had a thousand things she would have liked to do this past weekend, but alas, she was willing to hang out while I screamed at the TV for a combined total of six hours of basketball.

Anyway. Before I get to games three and four, let me assert my opinion on another matter. In our upcoming Summer Issue, there is a list of surfing movies you should watch. While I have no big objections to the existing list per se, here is a list of my own you should check out (assuming you are actually into surfing movies): Thicker than Water, Brokedown Melody, Shelter, September Sessions.

Back to the Jazz. Wasn't it nice to see youthful faces like David Archuleta and Vanessa Anne Hudgens rather than decrepit faces like Jack Nicholson (every two minutes) and Pamela Anderson (gross)? That's the difference between Utah and L.A.

How about Boozer, and his decision to show up Friday night? I'd say he's back, but I'm not really sure what that even means, and after Sunday's game he is apparently still in hiding. I'm coming to the belief that we simply cannot depend on boozer to dominate...and we may not need to. I think it's possible for us to win with him only scoring 15 again. Here's why:

D-Will. As great as he's been (and I think he's been awesome), do you ever get the feeling he still hasn't given us his best game of the series? I do. Eventually, he's going to figure out how to force Fisher to show his age. Fisher has been playing out of his mind so far this series, and I seriously doubt he can keep it up. Having watched Fisher all last year, I'm confident in predicting we've already seen is best. Deron is going to go off for thirty either in game 5 or game 6. When he decides to be assertive, and when his three is going in like it as been, he IS better than CP3.

And what about Kirilenko and Okur? Those two are very hit and miss. However, they are driven by confidence, and both seem to have it right now. When Okur is hitting his outside shot late in games, we can beat anybody. When Kirilenko is playing hard and using his length well, we are suddenly a decent defensive team too. Those two will continue to be important pieces of the Jazz playoff stretch.

And now for the man that I believe was vital to our win on Sunday: Ronnie Price. Question: What happens if he doesn't take that hard foul and block Walton's easy layup? I think we lose some of the moxie we needed to win that game. Price's courage on the court is influencing other players. If there was such a stat as courage-per-inch-per-minute-played, Price would be setting all-time records. Every championship caliber team needs a guy like him (and Harpring), who are willing to lay it all out on the line (and even get thrown out of the game ifor head butting somebody if need be). Seriously, I think Price is the one player that the Lakers are least likely to want to fight. Think about it. Chances are, he's much smaller than you, and in the back of your mind you're thinking, "I think he might be able to take me." After all, he does lead the league in courage-per-inch-per-minutes-played.

I get the feeling that if you took out Boozer and Kobe, we'd sweep this series. So much of game 5 will depend on Kobe's back. If he's still hurting, we have a good chance. They're bound to have an off shooting night from the three-point line one of these games. And Fisher is bound to come back to reality. I won't make any predictions for game 5, but here's hoping our role players continue to play strong, Kobe's back is broken, and Jack Nicholson can't make the game. On the list of overrated fans, he wins first, second, and fourth place.

All Yankee fans deserve to be tied at 3.