Shaquille O'Neal scored 14 points and had 16 rebounds and Steve Nash contributed with 14 assistances to take the Phoenix Suns to a victory of 94-87 against the San Antonio Spurs.
In the last three minutes of the game Phoenix had much more points overall than the Spurs but O'Neal entered to wrap up the score board. O'Neal became the third player in the NBA along with Kareem-Abdul Jabaar and Hakeem Olajuwon to score 26,000 points and to block 11,500 rebounds.
The seven feet and an one inch basketball star played with all the roughness and usual power; he was even thrown over the steps of the third row to recover a ball; nearly collapsing a spectator.
Grant Hill scored 18 points including a basket from the base line only one-minute remaining; the Suns showed why they needed O'Neal to play with the rest of his team.
The Argentinean Manu Ginobili played 31:59 minutes scoring 22 points leading the offensive of his team and recovering five rebounds and distributing two assistances for the Spurs; the French Tony Parker scored 21 points and distributed five assistances and recovered a pair of rebounds, while the Argentinean Fabricio Oberto played 10:26 minutes and scored four points while recovering five rebounds. Another player who gave an additional boost was the Brazilian Leandro Barbosa played 28:16 minutes scoring 10 points and recovering four repercussions.
Meantime in Toronto, the Raptors played the Seattle Supersonics achieving a victory of 114-106 with players like Anthony Parker who scored 23 points and Argentinean Carlos Delfino with 15 points.
The Sonics have lost eight of their last nine games and everything points the team is condemned to finish with the worst record in the history.
Then we have the Philadelphia 76ers' victory over the Bucks a final score of 119-97. Thaddeus Young scored 22 points while Samuel Dalembert added 18 points and 10 rebounds. Andre Miller played the first of five games in seven days. The 76ers' fourth repeated victory placed them on track to the game in Washington; the team is currently in sixth position in the Eastern Conference classification.
Another victory was for the Detroit Pistons that won over the Chicago Bulls with a final score 116-109 and a their seventh consecutive pass to the playoffs. Pistons' Tayshaun Prince scored 21 points and was the lead man without a doubt. While the Argentinean from the Chicago Bulls Andres Nocioni played almost 29 minutes scoring a total of 10 points.
And lastly but not least we have the LA Lakers game against the Sacramento Kings. Despite the efforts made by the Californian team Kobe Bryant was not able to block his counterparts for example Beno Udrich who scored a total of 25 points including a pair of free shots for the Kings. This is Sacramento's second consecutive win in nine games but there are other very important games that will follow and especially the one on Tuesday for which there are plenty of expectations.
