A Little Payback: Boston 101-New Jersey 93

[wfcooper@tiac.com (Bill Cooper)]

	The Celtics got another good, solid, confidence building win
as they evened their record on the season at 6-6 (With 5 wins in the
last 6 games).  The game was nearly a mirror image of the game on
Wednesday night in the Swamps, as the Celts fell behind early, and
then steadily rallied behind tremendous defense to overtake the Nets.

	The Celtics opened up the game as cold as a basketball team
could be.  Their tenacious defense was all that was keeping them in
the game, as the C's not only missed jumpers, but assorted, close-in
layups, jams, hook shots etc.  The Celts fell behind at 10-2,  and
then 21-8.  The quarter ended with the score at 21-10, as the Celts
shot 3-17 in the quarter.

	Things didn't improve much at the start of the 2nd either. The
Celts continued to shoot poorly (I think they were 4-24 at one point),
as they fell behind 31-16.  Things would have been worse, except for
wonderful individual defensive play by Pervis Ellison, who really
sparked the team.  Finally the C's shots began to fall.  Andrew
Declercq scored a couple of easy baskets and Dee Brown and Dana Barros
combined for 3 quick three pointers, to pull the Celts to within 5, at
38-33.  The Celts were upping the defensive pressure, though the
effect was mostly felt at the free throw line, as the Nets scored 14
of their last 16 points of the half from the line.  On the very last
play of the half, Tyus Edney made a mad charge down the court, got the
lay-up and the foul just as the buzzer sent off.  He hit the free
throw to tie the game going into the half at 47-47.

	The Celts finally began to heat up on offense as they ran off
a 15-2 streak to take a 64-53 lead (which they would keep, more or
less for the rest of the game).  At this point the Celts had outscored
the Nets 48-22, over about 14 minutes of playing time.  The Nets
stepped up their defense, but the C's played them even through the
rest of the quarter and took a 73-62 lead into the 4th.

	The Nets opened the 4th by briefly pulling to within 6 points
on the strength of a 7-2 run, but the C's responded with a run of
their own (4 points by Pervis) to go up by 12 (81-69).  Every time the
Nets began to get closer the Celts would respond in kind.  The Nets
score 4 unanswered to get within 6 at 84-78 (3:38 to go).  The Celts
ran a rather incompetent offensive set, which ended up with Greg Minor
getting the ball, closely guarded about 23 feet from the basket, and
about 6 seconds to go (not the best place to give Greg the ball).
Minor, realizing he wasn't going to get anything done, just handed the
ball off to Walker, who squared beautifully and drove a 3 pointer home
(87-78).  After the Nets closed to within 5 at 87-82, the Celts
defense suffered a breakdown and it looked like Chris Gattling was
going in for a strong jam to pull them to within 3.  Pervis Ellison
rejected Gattling in the strongest possible fashion, and Gattling
fouled Mercer during the scramble for the ball.  Ron hit both free
throws to put the C's up 89-82, sa Pervis's block caused a 4 point
swing and probably preserved the win for the C's.  The Celts hit 14
consecutive free throws to protect their lead, and won 101-93.

	Despite their ghastly start from the field, the C's actually
outshot the Nets .437 to .427 (over the last three periods the C's
were 28-54, .518).  The Celts also shot 6-13 from 3 points range.
Even with the foul-a-thon at the end of the game the Nets took more
free throws than the Celts 43-37, but the Celts shot better, hitting a
superb 33-37.  The Celts were outrebounded on the offensive boards,
but not too badly, but they did cough the ball up 26 times (including
15 by the starting front line).

Lineups:
Celts: Billups, Brown, McCarty, Walker, Knight
Nets: Cassell, Kittles, Gill, Gattling, Williams

Players:
Walker: Another strong effort for Antoine.  He shot 9-15, had 12
rebounds, and 5 assists.  His overall effort was marred by 6 turnovers
though.  His best moments of the night (beside that late 3), came when
he got the ball against the slower Jersey big men, and rather than
settling for the Jumper, drove pass them for easy passes or dishes.
The disappointing thing from a team point of view, is that when things
were going bad, in the first quarter, they didn't go to Antoine to get
themselves out of trouble.

McCarty: returned to his mortal form tonight.  Shot 1-6 and missed
several easy baskets.  Did chip in with 6 boards and 5 points in 23
minutes, but also picked up 5 fouls and 4 turnovers.  Was undressed by
Kendall Gill driving down the baseline numerous times (of course, so
are lots of players).

Knight: Nice work on D with 4 blocks, but had a miserable night on
offense as he shot 1-4 and turned the ball over  5 times in 21
minutes.

Billups: Another bad outing against the Nets as he shot 2-7, scored 6,
had 3 assists and 2 turnovers in 18 minutes.  Douglas and Cassell are
just a little too advanced for Chauncey right now.

Dee: Only took 4 shots in 26 minutes, and made 2, both 3's.  pretty
quiet beside that.

Pervis: has a guy who only scored 4 points and fouled out after 14
minutes of playing time ever had more (positive) impact on a game?  He
was crucial to the Celts getting back into the game in the 2nd period,
with  a series of blocks and steals that turned the tide, and then he
had the huge block down the stretch.  Along with his 4 points and 1
rebound he got credited for 5 blocks and 2 steals.

Edney: Another good contribution from Tyus, as he scored 12 points and
had 2 assists in 19 minutes.  Was a key to the Celtics good play in
the 3rd and early in the 4th quarters. =20

Mercer: Scored 11 points in 22 minutes, but continues to shoot the
ball poorly.  Shot 3-11and has lost his jumper.

Minor: 12 points off the bench, but only shot 2-8.  The Nets did a
good job of defending the mid-range jumper that Greg depends on.  He
did hit 8-9 on free throws, many down the stretch, and chipped in with
6 boards in his 29 minutes.

Dana: came in for a quick 11 minutes, sparked the team with some quick
offense and was gone just as fast. 8 points on 3-3 shooting in just 11
minutes.

DeClercq: 6 points, 6 boards, 5 fouls and 2 steals in 11 minutes of
playing time.  That's high energy!

Thomas: Finally noticed him out there as John established new NBA
highs in almost everything.  He scored 4 points in 10 minutes.  Bob
Hill, the former Spurs coach, who did the game for Turner, knows
Thomas pretty well, and said a) that he's a great kid, b) he
definitely has a future in the league, and c) that he isn't well
suited to the style that Pitino likes.

Coaching: I certainly can't criticize Pitino overall effort, as his
results have exceeded my wildest expectations, but I would like to
mention a couple of things that puzzled me about the game.  When the
C's were having so much trouble scoring in the first quarter, there
was no real effort to get Walker involved in the offense.  He only
touched the ball a couple of times as Billups and McCarty dominated
the offense.  I think it's fine to spread things around when the
offense is going well, but when things are slow, you have to go to
your best offensive players.
	And, with about 5 minutes to go in the game, Rick took Edney
(who had been doing a solid job) out of the game in favor of Billups,
who had not played well.  Billups responded with a series of poor
shots, fouls and turnovers, that came close to letting the Nets back
into the game (he also got tangled up with Cassell, and they both got
called for a double foul, which got Cassell out of the game: but I
doubt it was intentional).  Finally Pitino had to get Billups back out
of their and put Edney back in.  Now, maybe this experience will pay
off down the road for the rook and it's just a necessary part of the
learning process.  But it didn't make very much sense from the point
of view of winning this particular game (not that that's Pitno's
highest priority).

The Celt's record is now 6-6.  The play at 7:00 this Sunday against
the Pistons.

Bill Cooper
wfcooper@tiac.com