Here's todays sports news...

The Warriors season starts up tonight and in honor of the return of basketball, SFist Chris takes a look at the Warriors. ...

OK, so we've gotten some flak about picking the Warriors to take down the Dallas Mavericks in six games in the opening round of the NBA's western Conference playoffs. We'll be the first to admit it's a homer pick, because, well, we do really want the Warriors to win, and we'll be the first to admit it.

But our pie in the sky has an empirical basis. Here's five reasons why the Warriors will beat the Mavs in this playoff series.

Here's todays recap of last night's sports...

-A woman's car breaking down caused a huge chain of events leading to her death and three hours worth of traffic on the upper deck of the Bay Bridge. -Where oh where did the snow go? ...

You can exhale Warriors fans, there is hope. The universe works in mysterious ways, and yesterday, it worked for the Warriors.

Just when the flagging team needed it, on a day when they could only suit up seven players in a loss to the Clippers (as predicted by our LAist comrades), the Warriors announced that they had pulled off an almost unbelievable eight-player trade with the Indiana Pacers. And there is more good news. Some how, some way, VP of Basketball Operations Chris Mullin convinced his Indiana counterpart, Larry Bird, to take Mike Dunleavy and Troy Murphy. That's right! The Warriors unloaded both baby Duns and Man-o-War in one fell swoop. And it keeps getting better. In return, Mullin snagged Al Harrington to help bolster the frontcourt lineup and guard Stephen Jackson to, uh, help with the police lineup. Both teams also threw in a couple of redshirts to level out the financials and collective bargaining requirements, but even the redshirts are looking good.

Pacers 108 Warriors 106: In detailing the game, the Chron's Janny Hu actually uses the word "upset" to describe the Warriors loss. Now when was the last time those words have ever been said about a Warriors loss? Probably sometime last century. In this game, Al Harrington (who Chris Mullin tried to get in the off-season) sunk a last second three pointer to lead the Pacers over Golden State. ...