5 Things For May 1st: Scherzer Good Again as Tigers Down White Sox

1. Max Scherzer has been putting on quite the encore performance to his Cy Young winning 2013 season.  He cruised by the White Sox yesterday with six scoreless innings yesterday, striking out seven batters.  The bullpen was pretty good as well, giving up one run in three innings.

Bryan Holaday has filled in very nicely for Alex Avila.  Holaday had a 2-RBI double to give Detroit a four-run lead in the fourth-inning.  Miguel Cabrera continued his solid stretch with two more hits, and Ian Kinsler also chipped in with two hits.  The Tigers have an off-day today, and will play Kansas City this weekend.

2. There were three game sevens' in the NHL last night.

The craziest first round series has been between the Kings and Sharks.  San Jose jumped out to 3-0 lead in this series, including a couple lopsided victories.  Things then took an instant turn as LA ripped off three straight wins to tie the series.

After sitting him in game six, the Sharks went back to Antti Niemi for game seven.  San Jose got out to a 1-0 lead, and when the game was tied 1-1 Jonathon Quick came up with a marvelous save on Patrick Marleau:

The Kings came back and scored four unanswered goals, two of which were empty netters.  Jonathon Quick made 39 saves, and was terrific.  If there is a team not named Boston or Chicago that I could see winning the Stanley Cup, it would be the LA Kings.

The home team had won every game in the Wild/Avalanche series, but that trend did not hold up.  Nino Niederreiter beat Semyon Varlamov glove side in overtime to put the Wild in to the second round.  They will play the Blackhawks.  Have fun with that.

Finally, Steve Mason played extremely well for the Flyers, but it was not enough to give them a win over the Rangers.  Henrik Lundqvist played very well on the other end, stopping 27 of the 28 pucks thrown at him en route to a 2-1 win.

3. In the NBA, San Antonio got a crucial victory to put them up 3-2 in their series over the Mavs.  Tony Parker led SA with 23 points.

Toronto jumped out to a 26 point lead over the Nets, but barely held on to win.  The Nets went on a 32-8 run to tie the game with around three minutes remaining.  However, the Raptors were able to edge out a 115-113 victory.

The Rockets had their backs up against the wall, and delivered a 108-98 win over the Trail Blazers to stay alive.  Dwight Howard put up 22 points and 14 rebounds.

4. Heisman trophy winning quarterback Jameis Winston got himself into trouble yesterday for shoplifting.  He took $32.72 worth of groceries out of a Publix store.

5.  Also in the NBA, Mike D'Antoni has stepped down as the Lakers' coach.  The two sides reached an agreement that ensured that he would be paid at least $2 million next season.