Pirate Galaxy » the momentum built up against New Zealand. Its been a gr

EDMONTON -- Keith Acton has joined the Edmonton Oilers as an associate coach. Acton spent this past season in the Columbus Blue Jackets organization, where he served as an assistant coach. Before joining Columbus in 2012, he served as an assistant coach for 10 seasons with the Toronto Maple Leafs, where he worked with current Oilers head coach Dallas Eakins from 2006-2008. He has also spent time as an assistant coach with the New York Rangers and Philadelphia. As a player, Acton registered 584 points (226 goals, 358 assists) and 1,172 penalty minutes in 1,023 career NHL games with, Montreal, Minnesota, Edmonton, Philadelphia, Washington and the New York Islanders. The 55-year-old native of Stouffville, Ont., will join Kelly Buchberger, Steve Smith and Frederic Chabot on Eakins staff.Norman Powell Raptors Jersey . Pierce was ejected in the third quarter of Indianas 103-86 win Monday. George Hill stole a bad pass and was going in for a layup, and Pierce hustled back and appeared to be trying to wrap him up. Kyle Lowry Jersey . Most important, perhaps, it went off without a hitch. Organizers poked a little fun at the now-infamous opening ceremony gaffe that saw only four out of five snowflakes open up into rings, leaving the Olympics logo one ring short. http://www.nbaraptorsonline.com/Customized/ . R.J. Umberger scored twice to lead the Blue Jackets to a franchise-record for consecutive wins with a 5-3 victory Tuesday night over the Los Angeles Kings. Vince Carter Jersey . -- Claudio Bieler hadnt scored since early September, and not from the run of play since mid-July. Patrick McCaw Raptors Jersey . As the crowd erupted, Davis knocked the ball off the glass and back into his hands. With 1:14 to go in overtime, Davis sixth block also became his 17th rebound. That, along with his 32 points -- which tied a career high -- proved too much for Denver to overcome, and the Pelicans held on for their third straight victory, 111-107 on Sunday night.Opposite numbers Steven Smith and Kane Williamson have endorsed the push at ICC level for league structures for international cricket, after the Chappell-Hadlee series concluded in front of a small crowd at the MCG on Friday night.The importance of context to international matches was starkly underlined by an attendance of 20,591 for the match, little more than 18 months after Australia and New Zealand attracted more than 90,000 spectators for last years World Cup final at the same venue.Proposals presently before the ICC feature leagues for ODIs and Twenty20 internationals, with bilateral series of uniform length serving as World Cup qualifying matches, therefore adding meaning to every encounter beyond the present patchwork of series negotiated individually between competing teams.The arrangement for Australia and New Zealand to meet every summer was reached following the World Cup, with Australia agreeing to do so in part to help encourage New Zealand to submit to taking part in the inaugural day-night Test match in Adelaide last summer. However, these sorts of deals may soon be on the way out.Theres been a few proposals that have come up and you want as much relevance for every series as possible, Smith said. This series has been a great series, New Zealand are always fantastic to play against, theyre tough competitors and it was no different this series. Im proud of the way our guys played. After a tough tour to South Africa, where we lost 5-0, it was nice to turn things around and win every game in this series.For his part, Williamson said that the treadmill of matches made it difficult to think in terms of wider strategic goals, other than simply to try to improve each time he took his side to the middle - something he was unable to achieve thiis time around over the course of three defeats.ddddddddddddTheres a lot of chat about that at the moment, Williamson said of league structures. To be fair its quite hard to look or think about it too much, theres so much cricket going on that youre very much focused on the next game, trying to be better as a side and thats certainly my focus. It would be great to have as much meaning on every game as you can. From our sides perspective its about getting better and every games an opportunity to do that.As if to underline the point, Smiths men will fly to Brisbane on Saturday to prepare for the first Test against Pakistan, something he hoped would continue the momentum built up against New Zealand. Its been a great series for us and great for our confidence as well. Winnings a lot better than losing and it becomes a bit of a habit as well, Smith said. Hopefully we can keep up this habit for the rest of the summer.New Zealand fly home around the same time and have a brief break before hosting Bangladesh for a series of ODIs and T20s. Williamson was disappointed by the closing defeat at the MCG, failing to make a decent fist of chasing down a far more manageable total than those racked up by Australia in Sydney and Canberra.Very disappointing, Williamson said. At the halfway stage they were a little bit above par, just from a fantastic knock from Davey. But in saying that the way we were able to take wickets at the other end meant we were chasing a total that was certainly gettable if we were to play well. But we were far from playing well, losing wickets early ... wed like to think were much better than that chasing a total. ' ' '