The Cheat SheetBy Kevin McGuire on

It’s Monday. This is your Cheat Sheet.

Is there really any better way to start your week than by reading our daily roundup of all the sports news and notes worth reading, plus some other fun stuff mixed in while drinking your morning coffee? If there is, please do not tell me. Otherwise, I’ll feel my efforts have gone unappreciated and wasted here.

LeBron James continues to dominate the East

LeBron is four wins away from playing in ANOTHER NBA Finals.

The defending champions are back in the Eastern Conference Finals for a third straight year, and I will give you one guess who played a key role in the series-clinching win to wrap up a sweep of Toronto. Yep. It was LeBron James. LeBron turned in 35 points in the Cavs’ 109-102 victory to close out the Raptors in four games.

The Cavs will play either the Boston Celtics or the Washington Wizards. That series is knotted at two games apiece after John Wall helped his team pull even with Boston in a 121-102 victory in D.C. A 26-0 run in the third quarter could not have happened at a better time. The Wizards always seem to get a giant run like that these days, but none may have been more important than this one. Now, heading back to Boston, the series is guaranteed to return to D.C. for another game.

In the third game on the Sunday tripleheader card, the Houston Rockets evened their series with the San Antonio Spurs after a 125-104 victory in Houston. James Harden had another fine quality performance with a solid 28 points, 12 assists and five rebounds.

Houston’s Patrick Beverley played with a heavy heart after learning his grandfather had passed earlier in the day. This is gut-wrenching.

The series now becomes a best of three, while the Golden State Warriors have a chance to sweep the Utah Jazz tonight in the lone NBA game on the schedule.

Predators advance to Western Conference Final

Hockey is alive and well in Nashville.

For the first time in franchise history, the Nashville Predators are heading to the Western Conference Finals. The Predators defended home ice with a 3-1 victory over the St. Louis Blues to ice the series. Ryan Johansen’s go-ahead goal in the third period proved to be the difference-maker, and it was quite the beauty.

The Predators have now successfully survived a quarter of the bracket by sweeping out the No. 1 seed Chicago Blackhawks and taking down the No. 3 seed in six games. Nashville is now 8-2 in this postseason. They now await the winner of the Edmonton-Anaheim series, which now heads to a decisive Game 7 after the Oilers demolished the Ducks 7-1. Of course, the local news in Nashville jumped the gun a little bit…

In that Edmonton blowout, Leon Draisaitl had himself quite the productive evening.

Also, hockey dogs!

Matt Harvey suspended by Mets for… reasons

Matt Harvey
How you gonna get suspended on your day off?

The Mets suspended starting pitcher Matt Harvey for three days without pay on Sunday, with the suspension retroactive to Saturday. He was scheduled to pitch for the Mets on Sunday, menaing the team once again found itself in a situation in which it had to scratch its starting pitcher for one reason or another.

Harvey apparently broke team rules, although what those rules are remains unknown as the Mets announced they will keep the specifics of the situation in house. It does not appear to be related to the image the Mets shared on Twitter the other day with dildo in the background.

Don’t expect this to go down without some more tension, as Jon Heyman reports Harvey will file a grievance against the team over the suspension. Per Heyman, Harvey believes there was a simple miscommunication over his no-show for Saturday thanks to a headache after a round of golf on Saturday. Maybe next time, Harvey should just take a couple of Tylenol rather than stay home with a headache. Looking forward, Buster Olney says Harvey’s career is now at a crossroads.

Meanwhile, former Mets catcher Paul Lo Duca sounded off on the news.

https://twitter.com/paulloduca16/status/861255362472587264

https://twitter.com/paulloduca16/status/861271591576936448

Quick Hits

This was quite the pile-up in Talladega.

– The Yankees went for a sweep in Wrigley Field against the Chicago Cubs on Sunday night, and were a mere three outs away from doing so with a 4-1 lead. Enter Yankees closer Aroldis Chapman, the former Cubs power arm out of the bullpen last season, who promptly blew the three-run lead in the 9th inning.

The Cubs did welcome Chapman back with hugs and his World Series ring over the weekend.

– The Kentucky Derby was held on Saturday, with Always Dreaming pulling away for the win. One lucky person hit the trifecta. That’s a cool $8,298.20 payout for a $1 bet.

– America’s favorite student-athlete got his degree, and he took the moment to have a little fun at his own expense.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BTy-RbXFlYi/

– Staying in the state of Ohio, Cincinnati Bengals owner Mike Brown wrote an op-ed in the Cincinnati Enquirer to explain why the team drafted the controversial Joe Mixon in the draft. In it, Brown sells the idea Mixon is a changed man since the incident in which he was caught on video punching a woman. Just admit you took him because he is a talented running back and own it. In an unrelated Bengals story, head coach Marvin Williams poured ice water on the idea of John Ross and Billy Hamilton squaring off in a foot race. This really is the No Fun League.

– People were freaking out about a tweet from the account of Kristaps Porzingis this weekend. As you might expect, Porzingis said his account was hacked and he contacted Twitter about the situation.

– Wide receiver KD Cannon decided to leave Baylor a year early and enter the NFL Draft. He went undrafted and signed with San Francisco 49ers. On Sunday, he was released. At least he got a $50,000 signing bonus out of the team before being let go.

– Somebody made a flag out of the score bug from the Super Bowl when the Falcons had a lead nobody could possibly lose…

https://twitter.com/MichaelDeMocker/status/860633054192312320

– The Stanley Cup Playoffs aren’t the only hockey of note going on. The Men’s World Ice Hockey Championships are going on in Europe right now, and a number of NHL players are participating. As is the case with international competition, sometimes you have NHL teammates taking shots at each other, like this moment where Radko Gudas of the Philadelphia Flyers got a sucker punch in on his Flyers team captain Claude Giroux…

And here is another Flyer, Pierre-Edouard Bellemare handing off his player of the game award and free watch to France teammate and goalie Florian Hardy.

https://twitter.com/aj_ranger/status/861262436501999616

– Penn State kicker Joey Julius admits to battling an eating disorder.

– At least one Illinois baseball player at Illinois still thinks dabbing is cool…

– United States bobsledder Steven Holcomb passed away this weekend. He was just 37 years old.

– NASCAR crash!

– John Daly picked up a win at a PGA event for the first time since 2004. He also wore awesome American flag pants.

– Lacrosse is a fun sport to watch, and the NCAA’s men’s and women’s tournament brackets are ready to filled out.

– If you missed SNL this weekend, we have you covered.

– Japan has Super Mario postage stamps, and I went a pen pal from Japan more than ever.

– I went to see Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 over the weekend. Apparently, a lot of people did. Our Ian Casselberry has your review. I enjoyed it. If you are ready to dive into the easter eggs, Reddit probably has you covered.

The movie was even Deadpool approved.

– Imagine if you could golf while using a lightsabre instead of a regular club?

View post on imgur.com

One last gratuitous moment of procrastination

Mario Kart remains one of the most humbling experiences video gaming has to offer, and this video sums it up pretty nicely.

About Kevin McGuire

Contributor to Athlon Sports and The Comeback. Previously contributed to NBCSports.com. Host of the Locked On Nittany Lions Podcast. FWAA member and Philadelphia-area resident.

View all posts by Kevin McGuire