Posted April 20, 2006
The end is nigh, faithful readers.
This is the last edition of “The Tropolitan” for the 2005-2006 school year, and it’s been a wild ride indeed.
From race relations to Facebook monitoring, the Trop has covered a lot of ground this past year, and “The Big Picture” has been along every step of the way.
But as this semester winds to a close, there is no shortage of exciting events on the sports horizon.
The NBA playoffs begin this Saturday night, and this season’s edition of the postseason tournament is shaping up to be among the most exciting in recent years.
The deepest field of MVP candidates in more than a decade fills the playoffs — Kobe Bryant of the Lakers, Elton Brand of the Clippers, Steve Nash of the Suns, LeBron James of the Cavaliers, Carmelo Anthony of the Nuggets, Pau Gasol of the Grizzlies, Tim Duncan of the Spurs, Dwyane Wade of the Heat and Dirk Nowitzki of the Mavericks.
This star power is reminiscent of the mid-1990s, when superstars like Jordan, Malone, Stockton, Olajuwan, Barkley, Miller and Ewing permeated the playoff picture.
And, sure, the league’s elite teams appear to be obvious — Dallas, San Antonio, Phoenix, Detroit and Miami — but that doesn’t make this year’s match-ups any less appealing.
As of this printing, the seventh and eighth seeds were still up for grabs in the Western Conference, but all the potential match-ups are interesting.
Should the Lakers have won Wednesday night, they’d be set to face a beatable Phoenix Suns team, while the Kings would be relegated to facing the conference’s best team, the defending champion San Antonio Spurs.
Most interesting, however, is the match-up between the No. 3-seeded Denver Nuggets and the No. 6-seeded Los Angeles Clippers.
Because of the NBA’s weird and wacky playoff structure, the lower-seeded Clippers actually have home-court advantage over the Nuggets, who only have their high seed because of winning their weak division.
In the Eastern Conference, there appears to be a two-team race for the finals between the dominant Detroit Pistons and the dangerous Miami Heat.
The inevitable Pistons-Heat clash should be a sure-fire ratings grabber for TNT, and basketball fans everywhere should be excited about a rematch of last year’s awesome conference finals.
Not to be forgotten this summer is the Troy Trojans baseball team, which continues to put on amazing offensive displays week in and week out.
The Trojans’ quest for the Sun Belt Conference crown will undoubtedly be the most exciting event in Trojan athletics this summer.
In boxing, perhaps the sweet science’s most anticipated event of the year is upcoming.
On June 3 in Las Vegas, WBC Lightweight Champion Diego Corrales defends his title against Jose Luis Castillo in the third bout of their epic trilogy.
Their first fight was the consensus fight of the year in 2005, with Corrales making a dramatic comeback to win by knockout in the 10th round, while Castillo won the rematch but failed to make the 135-pound weight limit.
One thing is for sure, however — the big picture in sports is sure to be drastically different come August.