Klay Thompson notched up his 5,000th point and knocked down two late three-pointers in a 1 minute, 9 second span to lead the Golden State Warriors past the Detroit Pistons 105-98 for their fifth straight win.
Thompson finished with 27 points on 11-for-19 shooting in the Warriors’ 51st victory — matching their total from last season — and their eighth straight against Detroit.
Andre Drummond had a career-high 27 rebounds — 17 offensive — to go with 22 points in the Pistons’ eighth straight loss.
Thompson’s two 3s came during a decisive 18-2 run, including one with 5:37 left to put Golden State ahead by 10 as Detroit could not fight back.
NUGGETS 115, HAWKS 102
Danilo Gallinari scored 23 points and Will Barton added 16 as Denver beat Eastern Conference-leading Atlanta for their eighth straight home win over the Hawks.
By the end of the third quarter, Atlanta coach Mike Budenholzer had seen enough and inserted his bench players, who went on a 24-1 run midway through the fourth quarter to make the score respectable after trailing by 32 with 7:32 remaining.
The Hawks have not won in the Mile High City since Dec. 6, 2006.
Kyle Korver scored 18 points to lead Atlanta, hitting five three-pointers.
HEAT 104, NETS 98
Dwyane Wade had 28 points and nine assists, while Chris Andersen equaled a career high with 18 points and set a season high with 14 rebounds as Miami finished off a season sweep of Brooklyn.
Goran Dragic added 17 points in his return to the Miami lineup.
The Heat went 7-0 against New York’s two teams this season — 4-0 against the Nets and 3-0 against the Knicks — and moved back into the No. 8 spot in the Eastern Conference playoff race, helped by Sacramento beating Charlotte earlier on Wednesday night.
The Heat were without center Hassan Whiteside, serving a one-game suspension for elbowing Boston’s Kelly Olynyk on Monday night.
Deron Williams and Jarrett Jack each scored 18 points for the Nets. Brook Lopez finished with 15 points and 13 rebounds.
CELTICS 95, GRIZZLIES 92
Marcus Smart converted a go-ahead, three-point play with 52 seconds left, while Avery Bradley added a vital jump shot with 8 seconds remaining as Boston ended a five-game losing streak against Memphis.
Bradley scored 17 points to help the Celtics win their second in a row as they chase a playoff spot.
Smart put Boston ahead 91-90 with the last of 14 lead changes in the game, which ended when Mike Conley missed a deep three-pointer for Memphis just before the buzzer.
Conley led Memphis with 20 points after missing time in the second half with a leg injury.
Tony Allen added 16 points, while Zach Randolph had 14 points, eight rebounds and five assists.
BULLS 104, 76ERS 95, OT
Aaron Brooks scored seven of his season-high 31 points in overtime to help short-handed Chicago beat Philadelphia.
Pau Gasol had 27 points and 16 rebounds, while Nikola Mirotic finished with 16 points and 12 rebounds for the Bulls. They snapped a three-game skid without four regulars and three of their top five scorers.
The Bulls dressed only 10 players and were without Jimmy Butler, Derrick Rose, Taj Gibson and Joakim Noah.
Rose had knee surgery on Feb. 27, but said on Monday that he hopes to return this season, targeting four to six weeks for a comeback from yet another knee injury. Butler (elbow) missed his sixth straight game, while Gibson (ankle) sat out his seventh in a row. Noah (knee) was a late scratch.
Ish Smith led Philadelphia with a career-high 23 points.
TRAIL BLAZERS 105, ROCKETS 100
LaMarcus Aldridge had 26 points and 14 rebounds as Portland held off Houston.
The Trail Blazers limited James Harden to 18 points and tied the Rockets for third place in the Western Conference.
Harden was averaging just over 27 points to rank second in the league.
Corey Brewer scored 23 points for Houston, including 17 in the fourth quarter.
Robin Lopez finished with 16 points and 10 rebounds for the Blazers, who have won a Western Conference-best 27 games at home this season.
SUNS 106, TIMBERWOLVES 97
Markieff Morris scored 24 points and Eric Bledsoe had 18 points and nine assists as Phoenix beat Minnesota.
Rookie T.J. Warren added a career-high 17 points, while Marcus Thornton hit back-to-back three-pointers early in the fourth quarter and finished with 14 points.
Warren’s dunk with 3:20 left punctuated the win. He was fouled on the basket and made the free throw to give the Suns a 12-point lead.
Kevin Martin scored 16 points for Minnesota.
KINGS 113, HORNETS 106
Ben McLemore scored 27 points and Rudy Gay added 26 as Sacramento beat Charlotte to end a four-game losing streak.
DeMarcus Cousins had 20 points and 14 rebounds for the Kings.
Charlotte’s Kemba Walker scored six points in 16 minutes off the bench after missing 18 games following knee surgery, but the Hornets lost center Al Jefferson to a strained right calf late in the third quarter.
Michael Kidd-Gilchrist led Charlotte with 23 points.
BUCKS 97, MAGIC 91
Khris Middleton scored a season-high 30 points for the second time in three games to lead Milwaukee past the Orlando Magic.
Middleton, who also scored 30 points on Saturday night against Washington, was 12 of 17 from the floor.
Nikola Vucevic had 19 points and 14 rebounds for Orlando.
The Bucks have won 10 of their past 12 home games, while the Magic have lost nine a row on the road.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier