Reggie Bullock was feeling it from the perimeter on Sunday night and now his Dallas Mavericks appear to be in good position to have home-court advantage in the first round of the NBA playoffs. Bullock tied his season-high with 23 points and tied his career-high with seven 3-pointers as the Mavs earned a 114–100 home win over the Utah Jazz.

In a battle of Tar Heels who have endured tough seasons with their teams, Harrison Barnes and Cole Anthony both played well. But while Barnes had a huge late play, Anthony made a costly mistake. Barnes’ corner 3-pointer with 12 seconds left in overtime lifted the Sacramento Kings to a 114–110 road victory over the Orlando Magic in his best game in the last 10.

Cole Anthony has put together a run of good games of late, including his ninth double-double of the season. After scoring 14 points Tuesday in the Orlando Magic’s 94–90 home win over the Golden State Warriors, Anthony collected 17 points and tied his career-high with 11 assists in a 118–112 loss Wednesday at Oklahoma City.

Reggie Bullock returned after missing four games because of personal reasons but showed no rust from the break. Bullock scored 18 points and six 3-pointers, including a clutch 3 late in the game, as the Dallas Mavericks earned a 110–108 home victory over the Minnesota Timberwolves. Bullock also had seven rebounds as the Mavs avoided their first three-game losing streak since December.

Playing time with Brooklyn has been hard to come by lately for Day’Ron Sharpe, but he has made his mark in G League appearances with the Long Island Nets. On Wednesday afternoon, who collected 30 points and 20 rebounds in 36 minutes of Long Island’s 118–114 road loss to the Westchester Knicks.

It’s been a challenging season for the Orlando but the Magic have hit a nice stretch with four wins in the last seven games with the help of Cole Anthony. Anthony scored had 19 points and three 3-pointers with five assists in 24 efficient minutes Wednesday night as Orlando held on at home to beat New Orleans 108–99 on Wednesday night.

If you were looking forward to watching Cameron Johnson on national TV Sunday after his career-best game on Friday night, that unfortunately won’t happen. Johnson had 38 points and nine 3-pointers off the bench in Phoenix’s 115–114 home victory Friday over New York and banked in a buzzer-beating 3-pointer. But he’ll miss the Suns’ 3:30 Sunday game at Milwaukee (ABC) with a contusion to his right quad.

Cameron Johnson did it all for league-leading Phoenix on Friday night, scoring 38 points and nine 3-pointers, both career-highs, in only 28 minutes off the bench. He banked in a game-winning, buzzer-beating 3 to push the host Suns to a 115–114 victory over New York. Johnson joined Portland’s Damian Lillard (2019) as the only players in NBA history to hit a game-winning 3-pointer with at least nine 3s in a game. Johnson’s previous career-high was 24 points but he scored 21 Friday in the fourth quarter alone.

It was a big night in Texas for a pair of Tar Heels as Harrison Barnes scored 27 points in Sacramento’s victory at San Antonio and Reggie Bullock had a good all-around game in Dallas’ home victory over Golden State. Barnes collected four 3-pointers, five rebounds and two assists while making 11 of his career-high-tying 14 free-throw attempts in the Kings’ 115–112 win. The victory capped a crazy 24 hours for Sacramento full of plenty of frustrations.

Without Phoenix’s All-Star backcourt, some would have figured that the Suns might have a tough time winning on Wednesday night. But they didn’t figure Cameron Johnson into the equation. After the Suns has lost two consecutive games with Johnson in the starting lineup, he came off the bench to score 20 points, four 3-pointers and dish out four assists as they blew out Portland 120–90 at home for their 50th win of the season.

Without point guard Chris Paul, league-leading Phoenix is finding it tougher to win. Cameron Johnson is trying to do his part as a starter in Paul’s absence but it hasn’t been easy for the Suns. Johnson collected 23 points, four rebounds and five assists in Phoenix’s 118–114 Sunday home loss to Utah after the Suns lost at home to New Orleans on Friday. It’s the first back-to-back losses for the Suns since December.

While All-Star Chris Paul recovers from a fractured right thumb, the league-leading Phoenix Suns will need big contributions from other players.
In the first game after the All-Star break, Cameron Johnson — in his 11th start of the season and the first time since Jan. 30 — and was there to do his part. He collected 21 points, four 3-pointers, four rebounds, five assists and a block as the Suns easily won at Oklahoma City 124–104 for their eighth consecutive victory.

Cole Anthony’s big All-Star weekend in Cleveland gets started at 9 p.m. Friday when he plays in the Rising Stars challenge for James Worthy’s team, and he’ll also compete in the Slam Dunk contest on Saturday night, both at the Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse. Team Worthy gets the competition started at 9 p.m. on TNT against former Indiana star Isiah Thomas’ team. In the other first-round game at 9:30, Gary Payton’s team will meet Rick Barry’s team. All four coaches are members of the NBA’s 75th-anniversary team.

Coby White had it all going for him on his 22nd birthday Wednesday night. White scored a season-high 31 points with five rebounds, six assists and a steal as the Chicago Bulls earned a 125–118 home win over the Sacramento Kings for their fifth consecutive victory. Chicago (38–21) took over the Eastern Conference lead by a half-game over the Miami Heat.