Some link-heavy shizzle for your good selves on a fine Thursday evening…

• After the Cavs-Hornets highlights this morning, ESPN showed Chris Paul's stats in games against other MVP-candidates this season. Against Garnett, Kobe and LeBron, CP has averaged 22 points, 13.2 assists, 3.7 boards, 3.2 steals and just 1.8 turnovers. His shooting hasn't been great (44% FGs, 26% 3Ps), but the fact that the Hornets are 5-1 in those games speaks volumes.
• The Lakers wound up losing to the Bobcats out in LA last night, meaning we're now a full game ahead of everyone else in the Western Conference standings. Still wicked tight in there though.

  Kobe got ejected after picking up his second tech late in that loss to the Bobcats. He's now got 15 T's on the season; one more and he gets an automatic one-game suspension.

• Hornets love from TrueHoop, Deadspin and SLAM this morning.
• I've noticed a couple of new Hornets' blogs sprouting up on these internets. Some dude named James Rees has taken over Ryan's old MVN haunt and is cranking out the good reads. Meanwhile, the Gambit Weekly blog has been around a while, but they've just recently begun posting plenty about the Hornets, including a report from Peja's bowling tournament last week.
• A few days old now, but still worth your time: At the Hive investigates the season Peja's been having, and concludes that the Serb is definitely earning the big bucks.
• Back to Chris Paul, and we just recently got sent along a link to his September 2007 appearance on "Wait Wait… Don't tell me!". Good stuff. Check it out here, and thanks to Kenneth for the heads up.
• Marcus Vinicius has returned home to Brazil to play ball.
• My last mention of Rafer Alston for at least a week, I swear: Rafer's mom is apparently a feisty lady, threatening to burn a picture of a reporter who wrote bad stuff about her wonderful son. If she keeps pulling shit like that, Chris Paul's mom will have to go kick her ass.
• A Cavs' blog gives a thorough run-down of the game yesterday, including the following before David West's heroics…

  99-98 CAVS. 7.7 seconds. People are dancing and screaming. We need this game. We want this game. We've got this game.

  David West wasn't listening.

• Gonna leave you with a couple of my favorite hoops-related sites at the moment. First is The Basketball Jones, which I've mentioned on here a few times before. Tas and Skeets over there throw out a podcast every weekday, discussing all that's worth discussing in the NBA. They've even been giving the Hornets some respect this week.

  Second site is The X's & O's of Basketball, which delivers great analysis of both pro and college ball, focusing on different teams and aspects of the game each day. Video and diagrams are included to help show what teams do in certain situations. Excellent stuff.

The evening is young. Go out and play. We'll have plenty for you ahead of the Celtics game tomorrow. Oh, and there's a viewing party for that one at Bruno's uptown in New Orleans, complete with Honeybees and everything. Get there if you can.