Pre Good Friday Sports Chowdah- Red Sox Bats Looking A-OK in 1st Road Win; Price is Wrong for Habs in Game 2; C's Survive Another Close Shave w/Knicks

RED SOX: After an impressive Patriot's Day rebound by Daisuke Matsuzaka in which he cut his ERA in half by going 7 innings & giving up one hit in Boston's 9-1 win against the Blue Jays, the Red Sox headed out west to Oakland.

The first game ended up with the Sox getting shut out 5-0 with Lackey allowing 1 run in six innings of work and the A's exploding for 4 more in the bottom of the 8th.

However, the Sox bounced back on the Wednesday day game. Although former Sox outfielder Coco Crisp put Oakland on the board first with a solo homer right out of the gate off of Clay Buchholz. Carl Crawford put the Sox on the board with a 2-out RBI single in the 2nd inning and Youkilis, JD Drew and Jed Lowrie homered to pad the Red Sox lead by a 5-1 margin. The A's would get a one back in the bottom of the 8th, but after giving up a 1-out Landon Powell RBI single in the bottom of the 9th Papelbon managed to get the next 2 batters to pop out for a 5-3 Boston win.

After the atrocious start, the Red Sox have won four out of their last five games- yesterday's win against the A's is their first road win of the season.

The Red Sox will head south to Orange County to take on the Angels tonight, with Josh Beckett (1.80 ERA; 2-1) going up against Tyler Chatwood (3.75 ERA; 1-1). First pitch is at 10:05 Eastern, 7:05 Pacific.

OTHER MLB NEWS: Commissioner Bud Selig announced that the league was stepping in to take control of the day to day operations of the LA Dodgers, citing uncertainty over owner Frank McCourt's uncertain financial situation and ongoing divorce proceedings.

McCourt released a statement saying that the Dodgers were in compliance with MLB financial guidelines.

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NHL: Unable to win at home, the Bruins instead got one on the road in Montreal Monday night. The Bruins got off to a 2-0 lead with goals from David Krejci and Nathan Horton in the first period, and after a Rich Peverly tally two minutes into the second, Montreal's Andrei Kostitsyn would get one past Tim Thomas to make it a 3-1 game heading into the 2nd intermission.

Montreal would make it a one goal game early in the 3rd with a Tomas Plekanec goal about 7 minutes in. However, after the Habs pulled netminder Carey Price with time running out in regulation, Boston's Chris Kelly would get an empty-netter to ice the game for the B's by a 4-2 final.

Kelly's empty-netter came after he was knocked down and hit his face on the goalpost earlier. He remained down for several minutes, but was kept in the game. While the team was staying in Lake Placid, NY prior to Game 4, Kelly was sent back to Boston to be examined for any facial fractures (although he is expected to be on the ice for Game 4 tonight).

Montreal still holds a 2-1 series lead, but the Bruins have the chance to even things up on Thursday night at 7PM ET, 4 PT.

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NBA: A little closer than I would've liked, but the Celtics presently hold a 2-0 series lead over the NY Knicks after Tuesday night's game at the Garden. The win comes despite a 40 point effort for the Knick's Carmello Anthony- although Rajon Rondo was no slouch himself with 30 points and 4 rebounds.

Kevin Garnett sank the go-ahead basket with all of 14 seconds remaining in regulation, then managed to steal the ball back from the Knicks with 4 seconds on the clock in the Celtic's 96-93 win over the Knicks.

The series resumes Friday night at Madison Square Garden 7PM ET (4 Pacific) and will be broadcast on ESPN.