NBASALT LAKE CITY (AP) Chris Paul had 27 points and 12 rebounds while James Harden scored 24 points to power the Houston Rockets to a 100-87 win over the Utah Jazz on Sunday night Gabriel Landeskog Jersey Kids , taking a 3-1 lead in the Western Conference semifinal series.Paul, playing the sidekick to Harden for most of his first season in Houston, took center stage, controlling the tempo and getting to his favorite spots as the Rockets led from start to finish.Donovan Mitchell scored 25 before fouling out and Joe Ingles had 15 for the Jazz.Mitchell started finding lanes to the basket late and got the Jazz within 85-80 after he fueled a 10-2 run. But Paul, who matched his scoring high for this playoff run, hit a pull-up jumper and found Trevor Ariza for a 3-pointer to put the Rockets back up by double digits and they never looked back.NEW ORLEANS (AP) – Kevin Durant had 38 points and nine rebounds and Golden State soundly defeated the New Orleans Pelicans 118-92 on Sunday to take a commanding 3-1 lead in their Western Conference semifinal series.The Warriors responded to their 19-point loss in Game 3 with a resounding effort that produced a wire-to-wire win with leads as large as 26 points.Durant made 15 of 27 shots. Stephen Curry scored 23, Klay Thompson added 13 and Quinn Cook, who was a Pelicans reserve earlier this season, contributed 12 points.NEW YORK (AP) – The NBA has fined Toronto Raptors president Masai Ujiri $25,000 for walking onto the court at halftime of Game 3 against the Cleveland Cavaliers to verbally confront officials for reversing a call.It stems from an incident that occurred Saturday night during the Raptors’ 105-103 loss to the Cavaliers.Toronto had been called for 14 fouls in the first half, compared with eight for Cleveland. The Raptors were irate that what had appeared to be a Serge Ibaka basket and potential free throw was downgraded to a foul with no basket and no free throw.CLEVELAND (AP) – LeBron James banked in a running one-hander at the buzzer, giving Cleveland a 105-103 win over Toronto on Saturday night in Game 3 and shoving the Raptors to the edge of their most devastating playoff exit.After the Raptors tied it on rookie OG Anunoby’s 3-pointer with eight seconds left, James took the inbounds pass, dribbled the length of the floor and in one motion http://www.officialavalanche.com/authentic-adidas-j.t.-compher-jersey , dropped his 10-footer in front of Toronto’s stunned bench.James finished with 38 points, Kevin Love added 21 and 16 rebounds and Kyle Korver 18 for the Cavs, who can sweep the Raptors for the second straight year.PHILADELPHIA (AP) – Al Horford scored the go-ahead basket for Boston late in overtime in a wild Game 3 where the Philadelphia 76ers gave away the basketball and the confetti, leading the Celtics to a 101-98 win on Saturday night.The Celtics go for the sweep on Monday.The ending to regulation was about as wild as it gets for both teams. JJ Redick threw away the basketball on an errant pass to no one that was scooped by Terry Rozier who threw to Jaylen Brown for the basket and an 89-87 lead.Seconds later, Marco Belinelli stunned everyone with a falling 22-footer in front of the 76ers bench as time expired that sent the game into overtime – and confetti mistakenly blasted from the cannon. There was about a seven-minute delay while team employees scrambled to clean up the mess on the court.NHLSAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) – Marc-Andre Fleury made 28 saves in his fourth shutout of the playoffs and the expansion Vegas Golden Knights are headed to the Western Conference Final in their inaugural season after beating the San Jose Sharks 3-0 in Game 6 of their second-round series Sunday.Jonathan Marchessault opened the scoring, Nate Schmidt added an insurance goal that was only detectable by replay and Cody Eakin sealed it with an empty-netter to help Vegas become just the third team in NHL history to win multiple series in its first season.The Toronto Arenas won the Stanley Cup in the first postseason in league history in 1918 and St. Louis won two rounds to win the all-expansion West Division in 1968.TAMPA, Fla. (AP) – Brayden Point and J.T. Miller scored second-period goals, helping the Tampa Bay Lightning beat the Boston Bruins 3-1 Sunday and advance to the Eastern Conference final for the third time in four years.Andrei Vasilevskiy stopped 27 shots – 14 in the final period – for the Lightning, who rebounded from losing the series opener at home to eliminate the Bruins in five games.David Krejci scored in the final minute of the first period to give Boston a 1-0 lead that Point erased with his unassisted goal at 10:43 of the second.Miller’s power-play goal broke the tie less than four minutes later, and Anton Stralman added an empty-netter with 1:29 remaining to end any chance for a Boston comeback.WASHINGTON (AP) – Jakub Vrana scored the go-ahead goal with 4:38 remaining, Braden Holtby made 35 saves and the Washington Capitals beat the Pittsburgh Penguins 6-3 in Game 5 Saturday night to take a 3-2 lead in the second-round series and put the back-to-back defending Stanley Cup champions on the brink of elimination.Vrana made coach Barry Trotz look like a genius for moving him to the top line alongside Alex Ovechkin and Evgeny Kuznetsov, replacing Devante Smith-Pelly in the second period. Vrana sprung Kuznetsov for a breakaway on Washington’s tying goal 52 seconds into the third and finished off Ovechkin’s pass for the game-winner.The Capitals are one victory from advancing to the Eastern Conference final for the first time in the Ovechkin era and overall since 1998, when they reached the Stanley Cup Final. They can move on to face the winner of the Tampa Bay-Boston series if they win Game 6 Monday in Pittsburgh.NASHVILLE Youth Matt Nieto Jersey , Tenn. (AP) – Kyle Connor scored two goals and had an assist as the Winnipeg Jets beat the Nashville Predators 6-2 on Saturday night, pushing the Presidents’ Trophy winners to the brink of elimination with a 3-2 lead in their Western Conference semifinal.Now the Jets, who just won their first playoff series in the first round, will have a chance to clinch a spot in their first Western Conference final Monday night in Game 6 back in Winnipeg.Connor Hellebuyck made 38 saves for the Jets. Dustin Byfuglien and Mark Scheifele each had a goal and an assist, and Paul Stastny and Mathieu Perrault also scored.HORSE RACINGLOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) – Justify splashed through the slop to win the Kentucky Derby by 2 lengths on Saturday, becoming the first colt in 136 years to wear the roses after not racing as a 2-year-old.The colt that began his racing career in February improved to 4-0 and gave Bob Baffert his fifth Derby victory. That snapped a tie and left the 65-year-old trainer trailing only Ben Jones with six.Mike Smith earned his second Derby victory. The 52-year-old jockey crossed the finish line at Churchill Downs with only a few specks of mud on his white and green silks in the rainiest Derby in the race’s 144-year history. Nearly 3 inches fell on the crowd of 157,813 throughout the day.GOLFCHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) – Jason Day birdied two of his final three holes Sunday for a 2-under 69 and a two-shot victory over Aaron Wise and Nick Watney in the Wells Fargo Championship, his second victory this year.After squandering a three-shot lead on the back nine, Day rolled in a 20-foot birdie putt on the 16th hole and then effectively won the tournament when his tee shot on the 230-yard 17th hole crashed into the flagstick and settled 3 feet away. He was the only player to make birdie on No. 17 at Quail Hollow in the final round, and it staked him to a two-shot lead.Wise, a PGA Tour rookie, saved par on his last two holes for a 68. Watney made a 59-foot birdie putt on the last hole for a 69 and his best finish in three years.Day finished at 12-under 272 and returns to the top 10 in the world. BUFFALO Mikko Rantanen Jersey , N.Y. (AP) — While keeping open the possibility of a late playoff push, Edmonton Oilers captain Connor McDavid acknowledged how much losing has worn on him this year. In Buffalo, Sabres captain Jack Eichel grew irritated when asked about his team’s inability to win consecutive games in nearly three months.“I don’t have an answer for you right now,” Eichel said following a 5-2 loss at Toronto on Saturday, a day after beating Pittsburgh.What’s becoming abundantly clear since McDavid and Eichel were selected with the top two picks in the 2015 draft is it takes more than the arrival of a so-called “once-in-a-generation” star to transform a losing team into a contender.“It’s a team sport. Things don’t get fixed with one player,” Sabres forward Kyle Okposo said before a 4-3 loss to the Oilers on Monday night. “They can certainly help. But it’s a collective effort.”The game against Edmonton was an example of Okposo’s viewpoint. Eichel scored twice, including his career-high-matching 25th, but the Sabres squandered a 3-1 second-period lead.McDavid and Eichel are the faces of their respective franchises based on both production and salary. The 22-year-old McDavid is in the first season of an eight-year, $100 million contract, and the 22-year-old Eichel is in the first season of an eight-year, $80 million deal.Their respective teams have barely made a dent in the standings, with both entering the final month of the season in jeopardy of missing the playoffs.The comparisons are striking.The Oilers have advanced to the playoffs just once with McDavid, in 2016-17, when they were knocked out in the second round by San Jose. Buffalo is in the midst of a franchise-worst seven-year playoff drought Nathan MacKinnon Jersey , and finished last overall twice with Eichel.Both teams also have changed GMs and coaches since 2015. The Oilers fired general manager Peter Chiarelli and coach Todd McLellan in separate moves this season. The Sabres dismissed GM Tim Murray and coach Dan Bylsma in April 2017.It doesn’t come close to the expectations right after the 2015 draft in Florida, where the Canadian-born McDavid was picked first and the American Eichel second, to the delight of each team’s respective fan base.As much as McDavid and Eichel dislike the comparisons to each other, they’re in agreement in saying how unfair the expectations were.“I don’t think that’s possible at all,” McDavid said of one player changing a franchise’s trajectory. “I don’t think in this league, where it’s so competitive each and every night, that one guy can change it.”McDavid has won two scoring titles and was the league’s MVP in 2017.Overall, McDavid’s 348 points (120 goals, 228 assists) in 271 games are third among NHL players since 2015-16. Eichel has 249 points (98 goals, 151 assists) in 272 games, and ranks 29th over the same span following Monday’s game.Inconsistency has all but scuttled the Sabres’ playoff chances this season.In going 13-22-6 since a 10-game winning streak in November, they’ve gone from briefly sitting atop the Eastern Conference standings to 11th, and nine points out of contention.It’s a slide during which Buffalo has failed to win consecutive games since Dec. 11-13. Eichel has been among the few constants. His worst point drought lasted five games.“It’s a team game and you need everyone pulling in the same direction,” said Eichel Authentic Alexander Wennberg Jersey , who has a career-best 72 points this season. “It’s the best league in the world. You can’t expect it to be easy. And I think we all expected it to be hard, and I think it has been.”The Oilers slipped out of the playoff race following a 1-8-2 skid that began on Jan. 19. Edmonton has rebounded by going 5-1-2 in its past eight, but still sits 11th in the West, and six points out of contention.With 33 goals and 59 assists, McDavid is the first Oilers’ player to reach 90 points in three consecutive seasons since Jari Kurri (1983-1990) and Mark Messier (1987-90).“Connor does a ton for us, and obviously, you see the offensive numbers, but it’s more than that,” forward Sam Gagner said when asked how the Oilers might miss the playoffs despite McDavid’s contributions.“We still feel like we have an opportunity to get back in this,” Gagner added. “We’re still in the playoff picture. And hopefully we can get there and put that issue to rest.”