WebProNews

Tag: Basketball

  • Kevin Durant’s Rucker Park Performance Goes Viral

    Oklahoma City Thunder All-Star Kevin Durant took to Harlem last night to play a little ball. Apparently things went swimmingly.

    The game took place at New York’s famous Rucker Park, the legendary basketball court that has hosted the game’s greats from Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to Kobe Bryant to Wilt Chamberlain. It’s basically a basketball holy site, where many NBA stars got their start.

    Last night was Durant’s first time at the historic court. His team won a close game, 99-93. Durant scored two-thirds of their points. That’s right, he dropped 66 including 9 for 11 shooting from downtown. He hit five straight in the 4th quarter and as the video below will show, they are from well-beyond NBA range.

    Yeah, I know, who’s really going to guard him out there, right? Say what you will, that’s an impressive performance.

    The Twitterverse is going crazy over the performance.

    This is beautiful… and why we love @KDTrey5! #ThunderUp!!!! http://t.co/z54qeQ3 Our man, KD at Rucker Park in Harlem… 2 hours ago via web · powered by @socialditto

    Just read (and saw video) that @KDTrey5 has 66 points in a game at Rucker Park last night. That’s legendary stuff right there. #crazyswag 3 hours ago via web · powered by @socialditto

    Tomorrow, Kevin Durant will score 98 points at a random New Jersey YMCA. 54 minutes ago via TweetDeck · powered by @socialditto

    SOURCES: Russell Westbrook doesn’t understand why Kevin Durant’s Rucker Park team kept passing him the ball #NBA 2 hours ago via web · powered by @socialditto

    This Kevin Durant video is TOO crazy. Much respect to that man. 17 minutes ago via web · powered by @socialditto

    It’s good to see that he’s keeping sharp for the (possibly) upcoming season.

  • Shaq Retires Via Twitter

    The Shaq Attaq, Shaq Fu, Shaq Diesel, The Real Deal – Shaquille O’Neal has announced his retirement from basketball via Twitter.

    “We did it,” he says in a video linked from his Twitter account. “19 years, baby, I wanna thank you very much. That’s why I’m telling you first, I’m about to retire.”

    It looks like Shaq has jumped the traditional channels such as ESPN or an official press conference to tell his 3.8 million followers on Twitter the big news first. He has tweeted a few times within the last hour, using the hashtag #ShaqRetires.

    im retiring Video: http://bit.ly/kvLtE3 #ShaqRetires 49 minutes ago via web · powered by @socialditto

    The 7ft. 1 in. star played in the NBA with 6 teams, most recently the Boston Celtics. He began his career with the Orlando Magic and spent the majority of his career with the Los Angeles Lakers.

    The announcement video he linked to on Twitter is on Tout.com, a short video sharing app that links up with Twitter, Facebook and other social outlets for quick “video status” sharing. I Wonder if Shaq has a stake in the startup? Here’s the video, pulled from YouTube:

    [Image Courtesy Shaq’s Twitter Account]

  • NBA Playoffs Twitter Style

    If you follow the NBA, you know that it’s almost playoff time. The playoffs start on Saturday at 1pm Eastern.

    In typical Twitter fashion (see last year’s NFL Playoffs), Twitter is encouraging basketball fans to follow their favorite players and teams on Twitter. The company has on official blog post up providing resources for building your Twitter fandom.

    Twitter points to this @NBA list with all the teams (not just the playoff teams):

    Twitter list for NBA TeamsThey also have a list of about 200 players.

    Twitter suggests following the following accounts for actual coverage:

    In the meantime, perhaps you’ll enjoy watching the new YouTube series The Lebrons.

    If you’re really a hardcore basketball fan, it might interest you to know that the Basketball section in our own Twellow (Twitter yellow pages service) has over 30,000 accounts to follow, including players, coaches, teams, sports news publications, and other fans.

  • VCU Basketball Top Final Four Team As Far As Yahoo Search Trends Go

    If Yahoo search trends determined the winner of the Final Four, the company says, VCU would beat Kentucky in the title game. Talk like that might lose Yahoo some users around these parts. That would mean the University of Kentucky was able to get to the championship though, so it might slide.

    VCU is the top-searched team in the Final Four with searches for “VCU basketball” up 143% this week, Yahoo says. Kentucky is the second-most-searched team, followed by Butler and then UConn.

    I’m going to go out on a limb and suggest a good portion of the people searching for VCU are people that have no idea who VCU is, and are therefore looking to find out.

    Final Four Search Trends from Yahoo!: http://www.ysearchblog.com/2011/03/30/yahoo-search-trends-final-four/ 7 minutes ago via HootSuite · powered by @socialditto

    The top coach searches are as follows:

    1. Shaka Smart, VCU (searches up 2,199% this week)
    2. Brad Stevens, Butler (searches up 416% this week)
    3. John Calipari, Kentucky (searches up 252% this week)
    4. Jim Calhoun, UConn

    “VCU coach Shaka Smart has caught the country’s attention,” Yahoo says. “People seem most interested in his bio, wedding and ethnicity with searches for those things spiking off the charts on Yahoo!”

    Some other nuggests from the search trends:

    –  As Butler appears in the Final Four for its second straight year, there are 119% more searches this week for “Butler basketball” than there were during the same week last year.

    – Searches for “unthinkable Final Four” and “lowest seed to make Final Four” are spiking off the charts this week, Yahoo says.

    – Fewer people are searching for Final Four tickets. Searches this week for “Final Four tickets” on Yahoo! are 42% lower compared to searches last year,  and 94% lower compared to searches in 2009.

    UConn’s Kemba Walker is the most-searched player in the Final Four – 2.4 times higher than searches for Kentucky’s Brandon Knight, 6.4 times higher than searches for Butler’s Matt Howard and 13.6 times higher than searches for VCU’s Jamie Skeen.

  • Bing to Appear on Women’s Basketball Jerseys

    Microsoft announced today that it has signed a multiyear marquee partnership with the Seattle Storm and the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA). A representative for Bing tells WebProNews that the following will represent the following opportunities for Bing:

    – Bing will be able to share its brand with a devoted and passionate fan base.

    – Bing will be the official decision engine of stormbasketball.com.

    –  Bing logo and name will appear on the front of the Storm’s home and visitor jerseys and shooting shirts, and in-arena signage.

    –  Storm will debut its new uniforms when the team hits the court for the season opener of its 11th season on Sunday, May 2.

    –  Bing is the third major marquee partner to the WNBA.

    Bing Appears on Seattle Storm Jerseys

    "The Seattle Storm is a major sports franchise in a major market, and we are thrilled to join with them and invest in our hometown," said Danielle Tiedt, general manager of Marketing for Bing at Microsoft. "Bing shares in the passion and dedication that the Storm organization has for the Seattle community and this partnership helps Bing reach the Storm’s dedicated fan base in a unique way."

    Bing is certainly not letting up on the marketing.

    Storm President and CEO says both the Storm and Bing are "leading organizations in our respective fields." I wonder what Google would have to say about that or 2009 WNBA Champions the Phoenix Mercury for that matter.

  • Coca Cola Teaming Up With Posterous For NCAA B-Ball Tournament Event

    When I saw this ‘announcement’ I really wanted to check into what was going on because it involved a brand I have been a lifelong fanatic of (Coca Cola) and one that I have recently started to really enjoy, Posterous.

    While I sometimes wonder why people get so attached to brands and think it’s a little weird, I have to admit that I am almost over the top with my Coke addiction (go ahead and snicker and insert silly drug reference here). I actually refuse to drink other soda products unless there is literally no other choice. Also, I just like the logo and the sense of Americana it carries. Of course, with the amount of aspartame I have ingested drinking Diet Coke for years I will likely prove those lab rats correct but, hey, everyone has to check out of here for some reason, right?

    Anyway, back to the marketing stuff. Posterous has teamed with Coke but there is a unique business spin on this one for Posterous which is a free “blog service” to consumers. You see, Coca Cola is actually paying Posterous for it being the platform for a contest they are running that will be part of the NCAA Basketball Tournament this year.

    TechCrunch provides the overview

    One of Posterous’ first “clients” is Coca-Cola, which is definitely a good first start. Coca-Cola is using Posterous for its NCAA “Dept of Fannovation” where people can come up with ideas to improve the experience of being a fan, and a chance to win $10,000.

    Coca-Cola’s use of Posterous revolves around the “post moderation” feature. Any Posterous site can be enabled so that anyone can email post@sitename.posterous.com. The site owner can then moderate those posts, and publish them with a single click. This feature can be used to crowdsource images, video, and text from users.

    I have not followed through on the idea submission process on this one so I have not seen this in action. I do see though that on the “Dept. of Fannovation “site” which is a very dark site in its theme because the actual Coke product for this is Coke Zero, there is a nice yellow Posterous tab that could do quite nicely to make the service more well known to a crowd (college hoops fans) that is young enough to understand it and get it.

    So it looks like Posterous is taking the same tact as Twitter and deciding that the money to be made is in the corporate market. Keep it free for the regular folks so they can be herded for companies to pick apart and market to the ones they need. Sounds cold and analytical but marketing can be that sometimes, can’t it?

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