NBA LEAGUE UPDATE

Shaquille O’Neal was officially introduced to the Boston media in Waltham Tuesday morning.

The Miami Heat may have gotten the lion’s share of attention in the NBA this offseason for signing LeBron James and Chris Bosh, but the Celtics’ acquisition of O’Neal made a huge splash in Boston as every media outlet in town descended upon the Celtics’ practice facility to cover the event.

Doc Rivers said he expects Shaq to play “20-25″ minutes a night, and O’Neal said he’s fine with whatever playing time he can gets. “If that’s what it takes for us to win, that’s fine with me,” O’Neal said.

With Kevin Garnett watching from a balcony above, O’Neal and Rivers made it clear: it’s championship or bust this season.

The Miami Heat now has its new rosters. And what is shocking is the three players consisting the new roster are Dwayne Wade, Lebron James, and Chris Bosh. James  from the Cavs and Bosh from Raptors made their ways to Miami in order to signed contract to the team and according to reports, they decided to accept lower salary inspite of their high reputation in the NBA because they wanted to taste championship. So with Wade, the team now has trio, but inspite of this some NBA players like Rajon Rondo of the Boston Celtics said they are not scared of the trio and he is much determined that the Celtics can still enter into the finals of the next season inspite of Rasheed Wallace retirement and Tony Allen signed to the Memphis Grizzlies.

Rajon Pierre Rondo (born February 22, 1986) is an American professional basketball player who plays point guard for the Boston Celtics of the National Basketball Association (NBA). Born in Louisville, Kentucky, Rondo attended Eastern High School and Oak Hill Academy for his high-school basketball career, before receiving a scholarship from the University of Kentucky. He played for two years at Kentucky before declaring for the 2006 NBA Draft, represented by agent Bill Duffy.

During the draft, Rondo was selected 21st overall by the Phoenix Suns, and was subsequently traded to the Boston Celtics, where he made his NBA debut as a rookie during the 2006–07 season. He played a supporting role before he established himself as the starting point guard for the Celtics during the 2007–08 season. That season, Rondo earned his first NBA Championship, playing alongside All-Stars Kevin Garnett, Ray Allen and Paul Pierce. His breakout performance came during the 2009 NBA Playoffs, helping his team to the second round.

Rondo was born on February 22, 1986 in Louisville, Kentucky to Amber Rondo. He has three siblings: Dymon, William and Anton. He had little contact with his father, who left his family when he was seven years old. To support the family, his mother worked the third shift at Philip Morris USA, a tobacco company. Rondo was first interested in football, before his mother steered him towards basketball because she felt that the sport would be less punishing on his skinny frame. After Rondo became serious about basketball, he attended Louisville’s Eastern High School for three years where he played under head coach Doug Bibby. During his junior year at Eastern High School, he averaged 27.9 points, 10.0 rebounds and 7.5 assists which earned him earned a spot on the All-State honors and was named the 7th Region Player of the Year. He transferred to Virginia’s Oak Hill Academy for his senior year where he averaged 21.0 points per game (ppg), 3.0 rebounds per game (rpg) and 12.0 assists per game (apg) and finished the 2003-04 season with a 38-0 record. In his senior year at Oak Hill Academy, Rondo broke Jeff McInnis’s single-season school record of 303 assists, while averaging a double-double. There, he included two efforts of 27 assists and a single-game school record of 31, merely four away from the all-time national record. He also had a 55 point game in high-school, second highest all-time in Oak Hill Academy, surpassed only by Calvin Duncan with 61. Rondo was named to the McDonald’s All-American Team in 2004 and scored a total of 14 points, 4 assists and 4 rebounds in the all-star game. He also participated in the 2004 Jordan Capital Classic game, logging 12 points, 5 assists and 4 steals. He ended his career as Oak Hill Academy’s all-time assists leader in a single season with 494 assists, surpassing Jeff McInnis.

Rondo committed to University of Kentucky over hometown University of Louisville, who spurned Rondo in favor of the higher-rated Sebastian Telfair.Rondo, along with All-Americans Joe Crawford and Randolph Morris, gave Kentucky the top-rated recruiting class for 2004 according to Rivals.com. Rondo led Kentucky to several wins including clutch-shot victories against the University of Louisville, South Carolina and Central Florida, but Kentucky failed to advance to the Final Four of the NCAA Tournament in either Rondo’s freshman or sophomore seasons. He was named to the SEC All-Freshmen Team. He set a Kentucky Wildcats record for most steals in single-season, with a total of 87 steals in his freshman year and made at least one steal in every game. He finished his freshman year at Kentucky averaging 8.1 points, 2.9 rebounds, 3.5 assists and 2.6 steals.

In his sophomore year he had a career high 12 assists against Ole Miss, despite playing just 23 minutes, and 25 points against Louisville. Rondo also set another Kentucky Wildcats record for most rebounds in a game by a guard, with 19 rebounds in an early season loss to Iowa. He was not known for being a shooter, however, going 18-66 from three with a 57.1% FT average. He averaged 11.2 points, 6.1 rebounds, 4.9 assists and 2.1 steals per game in his sophomore year. Rondo was also named to the 2005 USA Men’s Under-21 World Championship Team, which traveled to Argentina for the FIBA World Championships. He averaged 11.0 ppg and 4.5 apg in the eight-game tournament, garnering much attention from NBA scouts. The USA U-21 team won a gold medal at the Global Games held in Texas in late July.

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The 2010 NBA Summer League will be in Las Vegas, Nevada this July. The Summer League is a pro basketball league run by the NBA just following the NBA Draft. Teams consist of players who have been in the NBA for 3 years or fewer as well as newly drafted talent. It gives Rookies a chance to practice against other players that are new to the NBA. Games are held throughout the ten days at Thomas & Mack Center and Cox Pavilion on the UNLV Campus.

HERE ARE THE SCHEDULES

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The 2010 NBA Draft will be held on June 24, 2010 at the Theatre at Madison Square Garden in New York City, New York. The draft, which starts at 7:00 pm Eastern Daylight Time (2300 UTC), will be broadcast in the United States on ESPN. In this draft, National Basketball Association (NBA) teams will take turns selecting amateur U.S. college basketball players and other eligible players, including international players.

Eligibility rules

• All drafted players must be at least 19 years old during the calendar year of the draft. In terms of dates, players eligible for the 2010 draft must be born on or before December 31, 1991.
• Any player who is not an “international player”, as defined in the collective bargaining agreement (CBA) between the league and its players union, must be at least one year removed from the graduation of his high school class. The CBA defines “international players” as players who permanently resided outside the U.S. for three years prior to the draft, did not complete high school in the U.S., and have never enrolled at a U.S. college or university.

Early entrants

A player who is not automatically eligible must declare his eligibility for the draft by notifying the NBA offices in writing no later than 60 days before the draft. For the 2010 draft, this date fell on April 25. The basic requirements for automatic eligibility are completion of college eligibility for U.S. players and reaching age 19 no later than December 31 of the calendar year of the draft for international players. A more complete discussion of the rules for automatic draft eligibility is available in the “Eligibility” article.

A player who has hired an agent will forfeit his remaining college eligibility, regardless of whether he is drafted. Also, while the CBA allows a player to withdraw from the draft twice, the NCAA mandates that a player who has declared twice loses his college eligibility. One player affected by this rule was Patrick Patterson, who withdrew from the 2009 draft.

The following players announced that they would declare for the 2010 NBA Draft. Under NCAA rules that take effect with this draft, they only had until May 8 to withdraw from the draft and maintain their college eligibility. Previously, players who declared for the draft could withdraw as late as 10 days before the draft (the withdrawal deadline under the CBA) and still maintain college eligibility.

This draft was expected to see an unusual influx of underclassmen, even compared with recent years, for reasons explained by ESPN.com columnist Eamonn Brennan in an April 2010 piece:

This is a history of the Boston Celtics. The Boston Celtics is an American basketball team currently playing in the Atlantic Division of the Eastern Conference in the National Basketball Association (NBA). Over the years, the Celtics have won 17 NBA Championships.

1946–1956: The building of a dynasty

The Celtics were formed in 1946 as a team in the Basketball Association of America, and became part of the National Basketball Association after the merger of the BAA and the National Basketball League to form the NBA in the fall of 1949.^[1] In 1950, the Celtics became the first franchise to draft an African American player, signing Chuck Cooper.^[2]

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The NBA Finals were under a 2–3–2 rotation, with the Lakers holding home-court advantage as they had a better regular season record than the Celtics. This was the 12th time the teams had met in the championship round; the Celtics won nine of their previous eleven Finals meetings against the Lakers, winning in 1959, 1962, 1963, 1965, 1966, 1968, 1969, 1984, and 2008, while the Lakers won in 1985 and 1987. The Celtics have won the most NBA Championships, with 17. With their victory in the 2010 Finals, the Lakers now trail closely with 16.

This was the third straight year in which the L.A. Lakers advanced to the NBA Finals. These two teams last met in 2008, when the Celtics beat the Lakers 4–2. Paul Pierce was named series MVP in 2008. Much of both rosters have been kept intact, and the Celtics’ veterans Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett, Ray Allen, and Rasheed Wallace looked to add to their championship résumés while Kobe Bryant and the Lakers looked to even the score against the Celtics team. The Lakers were the current defending champions, having beaten the Orlando Magic 4–1 in the 2009 NBA Finals.

This was the first NBA Finals to go the full seven games since 2005, and only the fourth since the NBA switched the Finals to a 2–3–2 format in 1985. The home team has won Game 7 ever since. This is also the fifth Game 7 between the Lakers and Celtics. Boston had won all previous Game 7 match-ups between the two teams. In 2010, the Lakers won Game 7 with a final score of 83–79.

The Los Angeles Lakers became the 2010 NBA champions. Kobe Bryant earned his second consecutive NBA Finals MVP award.

The Celtics was on the lead on the first three quarters but they were pursued on the 4th and final quarter that lead to their lost. It scored 83-79 with only 4point lead by the Lakers. It was a great loss and a best luck for the Lakers because of the accidental injury of Celtics center Kendrick Perkins. In my own opinion if Perkins is on the floor during the 2nd to 4th quarter of Game 6, I think its up to there. There will be no Game 7 at all..Maybe the next NBA season, the same team will meet in the Finals and I know Boston will make it to the championship.. I hope Ray Allen will still continue to play with the Celtics and the team will make it..Rajon Rondo did his best on the floor the same as through with the rest of the team. Rasheed Wallace started scoring the game..Congratulations to the Lakers and to Kobe as the MVP..God Bless NBA.Mabuhay!!!!