ERST LESEN! » ore about their o

LAS VEGAS -- Denzel Valentine put a thrilling finish on the NBA Summer League.Valentine hit the tying 3-pointer with the final second of regulation, then made a jumper at the buzzer in overtime to give the Chicago Bulls an 84-82 victory over the Minnesota Timberwolves on Monday night.Valentine was scoreless on 0-for-6 shooting through three quarters, but he proved that fortunes change quickly in Las Vegas. His 3-pointer with 0.2 seconds forced the extra period after Tyus Jones had just given Minnesota a 77-74 lead on a 3 with 3.6 seconds to go.It was tied again on Xavier Silas 3 with 11.7 seconds remaining in OT, but Valentine, the college player of the year from Michigan State, worked the clock down before making his spinning jumper in the lane as the Bulls finished 7-0.That ended the NBA portion of summer basketball after leagues in Orlando, Salt Lake City and Las Vegas over the last two weeks. Rookies got their first looks, some veterans got their last shots, and it ended with a play that had Twitter buzzing like a game that took place in June instead of July.And just as the NBA stops, USA Basketball starts. Right on the same UNLV campus just hours before the summer league championship game, the U.S. Olympic team held its first training camp practice. The Olympics start on Aug. 5 in Rio de Janeiro and the Americans will hope to be playing for a third straight gold medal on Aug. 21.Then, finally, the offseason will finally start.A look back at the summer:MVP! MVP!OK, its actually Most Outstanding Player in the Final Four, so technically Tyus Jones would be MOP, MVP. The Minnesota Timberwolves point guard won Summer League MVP honors and finished with 27 points in nearly leading the 24th-seeded Wolves to the championship. He won the Final Four Most Outstanding Player award after leaving Duke past Wisconsin for the 2015 national championship.THIBODEAU BOWLThats what the Summer League championship game was dubbed, with coach Tom Thibodeaus new team (Minnesota) facing the Bulls team he coached for five seasons before he was fired. Thibodeau, an assistant on Mike Krzyzewskis U.S. Olympic team staff, took in the championship game from a baseline seat near Timberwolves players Karl-Anthony Towns and Zach LaVine.SIMMONS STOCKBen Simmons showed off the versatility that made him the No. 1 pick in the draft. The freshman from LSU played in four games for the Philadelphia 76ers in Las Vegas, averaging 12.3 points, 7.8 rebounds and 5.5 assists. If the 76ers do someday get the forward from Australia along with recent high picks Joel Embiid and Dario Saric on the court with second-year forward Jahlil Okafor, the future could be bright after a dismal recent past.ALL-SUMMER LEAGUE HONORSBesides Jones, the rest of the All-Summer League team, as voted by a panel of media members:First team: Jordan McRae (Cleveland), Bobby Portis (Chicago), Ben Simmons (Philadelphia) and Alan Williams (Phoenix).Second team: Jaylen Brown (Boston), Thon Maker (Milwaukee), Kelly Oubre Jr. (Washington), Normal Powell (Toronto) and Tyler Ulis (Phoenix).BULLS BACKCOURTChicago figures to have a starting backcourt of Dwyane Wade and Rajon Rondo after signing both players earlier this month, and theres some good young talent behind them. Valentine showed hes a clutch performer, while Jerian Grant, acquired from the Knicks in the trade for Derrick Rose, was MVP of the championship game with 24 points and 10 rebounds.PACKING THEM INThe summer league broke two attendance records in Las Vegas, including the overall attendance mark with 108,931. The previous mark was 99,437, set last year. Over 11 days, the summer league averaged 9,902 per day.The event also broke the single-day mark on July 9, when 16,208 visited both the Cox Pavilion and Thomas and Mack Center. The spotlight game that night featured the top two draft picks in last months draft, Simmons and the Lakers Brandon Ingram. The previous mark was 12,422, set last season, also on the day the top two draft picks met, with Towns and DAngelo Russell facing off.RISING SUNS?Phoenix got a look at a promising young core while going 4-2 in Las Vegas. All-Rookie selection Devin Booker averaged 26 points in his two games, top-10 picks Dragan Bender and Marquese Chriss both showed potential and guard Tyler Ulis looked like a second-round keeper. Ulis averaged 14.5 points and had 10.0 points and 9.0 rebounds per game. Bender, the No. 4 pick from Croatia, shot just 27.5 percent from the field but managed 8.6 points and 5.6 rebounds in his five games.---Freelance writer Willie Ramirez contributed to this report. Tom Heinsohn Jersey . Once again, DeLaet finished tied for second at a PGA Tour stop on the weekend, this time at the Waste Management Phoenix Open. The pride of Weyburn, Sask. Antoine Walker Jersey . Peter Holland and Brad Staubitz were sent to Toronto on Saturday as the Maple Leafs traded defenceman Jesse Blacker and draft picks to the Anaheim Ducks. https://www.cheapceltics.com/552n-k-c-jones-jersey-celtics.html . The 19-year-old Olsen played 34 games with the Kelowna Rockets of the WHL this season. In that time, hes recorded 17 goals and 17 assists with 36 penalty minutes. Kevin Garnett Jersey . At a Manhattan federal court hearing, attorney Jordan Siev said his law office has gotten more evidence nearly every day to support its lawsuit accusing MLB and Selig of going on a "witch hunt" to ruin Rodriguezs reputation and career. He said the defendants went "way over the line. Boston Celtics Pro Shop . Terms of the deal were not immediately available. The 26-year-old finished last season with Clevelands Triple-A affiliate in Columbus after signing with the Indians in August. Michael Clarke and Brad Haddin have counselled Australia against excessive sledging in the forthcoming Test series against South Africa, querying whether recent efforts to puff chests out detracted more from the teams performances than having any impact on the opposition.The Australia ODI team engaged in numerous verbal battles with South Africa over the course of a 5-0 series defeat on their recent tour, which followed captain Steven Smiths assertion that a quiet team needed to show more energy in the field. While Clarke and Haddin were both known for numerous verbal stoushes over their careers, they agreed that forcing the issue verbally would do more harm than good.Im probably contradicting the way I captained, because I loved that aggressive approach and while there was a line, I always liked the team I captained to head-butt that line, not overstep it but head-butt it. Thats how I thought we played our best cricket, Clarke told ESPNcricinfo. But the more I experienced got I believed it wasnt what you said it was what you did, so your performance wasnt dictated by your mouth.Im probably contradicting myself and my captaincy style because there were a couple of occasions where I did open my big mouth. The reason I did that with James Anderson was to stick up for George Bailey and the Dale Steyn one was sticking up for James Pattinson as well. But I shouldnt have said a word, in both situations there was no need for me to say anything.Clarke noted that numerous players from past eras were particularly talkative on the field because it is what worked for them, not because they felt compelled to do so out of some idealised image of the Australian cricketer. I think you need to do whats comfortable to you, he said. The team I grew up playing in that Australian team, they had Steve Waugh, Matthew Hayden, Shane Warne, these guys liked and enjoyed that verbal competition.That helped them perform. So if that helps you, as long as you dont overstep that mark, then go for your life. Theres a number of players around the world that enjoy that. I remember Kevin Pietersen loved that challenge against Mitchell Johnson or Shane Warne, whomever it was.So if it helps your game, do it, but I dont think you should force it. I think thatd be like me trying to bat like Ricky Ponting. The guys have got to work out what they feel is best for them individually and as a team and go for it. But if it doesnt suit your personality then I wouldnt try to be someone Im not. Haddin expressed the view that teams could make life uncomfortable for opponents without resorting to verbal abuse..dddddddddddd. Areas like aggressive fielding, running between the wickets and banter among team-mates - sometimes referred to as talking across the batsmen - could have the same effect without becoming a distraction from the primary goal - to win the game.I dont think its about what you say on the field, Haddin said. The best Australian teams Ive been a part of have been able to create an uncomfortable environment for the opposition with your body language, your movements around the game, and creating an atmosphere with each other where the opposition feels like theyre the only two people out there, or he [the batsman] feels like hes stuck out there by himself.Its the environment youre trying to create with your presence. That can be having the most athletic fielding team so the opposition feels uncomfortable there. Its about creating the environment to make the opposition feel they cant play their best. The best way you can do that is to create an environment where the opposition try to do something they dont normally do.Sometimes the best form of that is not to say anything - you wouldnt say anything to a Kevin Pietersen for example because hed dig his heels in and start taking it personally to hit us all around the park. One of the best things for him was to stay away from him.Conversely, Haddin felt that talking too much to opponents invariably led to a change in the power dynamic, as the sledgers revealed more about their own discomfort than those they were targeting. Talking too much to the opposition ... youve got to earn the right to play the way you want to play, Haddin said.Sometimes if youre just focusing on talking and trying to get a reaction it can have a negative effect on your team. The reason you create that uncomfortable environment there is to make the opposition do something they dont want to do. If it starts detracting from what youre trying to do then thats a problem.Asked to provide an example of a player who struck the right balance, Haddin mentioned Andrew Symonds. Andrew was one of the best team men I ever played with, he said. He didnt say a lot to the opposition, but his presence in the covers or when he had the ball he was always up for the contest.You knew if Andrew was there, the way he dived in the field and chased, the tempo he set running between the wickets, the opposition could look at him and says Hang on, the Australians are up for the fight today and that then puts doubt in their change room. ' ' '