The Next Lamb: The Miami Heat

Game 9: Boston (6-2) at Miami (5-3)

Thursday, November 11

8 p.m. Eastern

TNT

Last meeting: @Boston 88, Miami 80 (10/27/10)

A couple of weeks after Boston spoiled the debut of Pat Riley's super-team, not much has changed with the Miami Heat. Sure, they blew out the Orlando Magic later that week, but that's been the high point during this young season. More recently, the Heat have sandwiched a win over the New Jersey Nets with losses at New Orleans and at home to Utah -- the latter a stunning second-half collapse on Tuesday night.

Up until the second half of the Jazz game, the one consistent aspect of Miami's play this season was its defense. The Heat gave up 96 points in the loss to the Hornets; the only other time an opponent broke 90 was Election Day against the Timberwolves, a game Miami won by 32. That consistent defense was buying the Heat wins while the team comes together offensively and coach Erik Spoelstra figures out his rotations.

After being especially stingy in the first 24 minutes against the Jazz and taking a 51-32 lead into halftime, the Heat surrendered 72 second-half points -- more than they gave up in the entire game against the Magic. Utah needed every one of those 72 points to force overtime, and in the extra period, despite playing without Deron Williams (fouled out) and Al Jefferson (temporarily benched for ineffectiveness), the Jazz held on for the win.

My schedule has been such that I haven't had time to watch much of the Heat other than that first game against the Celtics. The Utah game is sitting on my DVR, but I'm not going to get a chance to get to it before I fly to DC Thursday morning. There's been no shortage of stuff written and said about the Heat, but a great majority of it seems to be centering around how the team is very much a work in progress. As a result, I don't really have any great insights on what to expect from these guys the second time around.

It does appear that Dwyane Wade has remained Miami's first offensive option despite the presence of James. He leads the team in scoring at 26 per (compared to 20.6 for James) and is taking two more shots per game than James. LeBron took over in the second half in the opener against the Celtics, but Wade has led the team in scoring in every other game but one.

This isn't necessarily a bad thing. Prior to the start of the season, I opined offline that Wade could go crazy this year if Lebron let him. By that I meant that opposing defenses would be so focused on LeBron that Wade would get disproportionately little attention relative to his considerable skill. More specifically, James is better at setting the table for his teammates than Wade is, so more of his value is preserved when he's not in the primary scoring role. (Put another way, Wade, when he's not scoring, is less valuable than LeBron when he's not scoring.)

However, James is a formidable scorer, a nearly unstoppable force when he decides that he's going to the basket. I heard on The Basketball Jones this morning that on his way to shooting 5-for-18 against the Jazz, James took a number of bad outside shots -- the same kind he used to take in Cleveland. With such limited depth, Miami needs to get both Wade and James playing dynamically to compete with the elite teams in the league.

Part of the reason that James isn't yet playing the way some had hoped is that he's basically playing point guard. That's not a new role for James, but what is new is that he now has teammates who deserve shots, and he'll be rightly criticized for overshooting with Wade and Bosh on his side. But his own offense can't be an afterthought, at least to the extent that it consists of shooting jumpers to keep the defense honest or to beat the shotclock. Eddie House and James Jones are alternating doing a good job of teaming up with Udonis Haslem to form a decent quintet on the floor, but James would benefit from some sort of contribution from Carlos Arroyo and Mario Chalmers -- something that doesn't seem to be in the offing any time soon.

Miami's frontcourt has been disappointing. Haslem is the only guy who is playing up to his (modest) expectations -- Ilgauskas is, too, I suppose, but expectations for him are too modest to consider. Bosh's shooting percentages are down significantly from when he was in Toronto -- a trend which, if it continues, makes no sense -- and he's not rebounding, which isn't a surprise. He also got torched by Paul Millsap against the Jazz. Miami's starting center, Joel Anthony, is still a complete non-factor offensively, and isn't good enough on the boards to just be a shotblocking specialist. A healthy Boston team could really exploit Miami in the post, but the health statuses of both O'Neals remain in question. Still, Kevin Garnett and Glen Davis could do some serious damage.

Comments are always encouraged on RwH, but especially so today. Miami's on TV all the damn time, and there's a good chance that some of you have seen the Heat more than I have. I feel like my preview here has been a little inadequate, so please chime in with your thoughts on Miami and the big game. Comments after the game are welcome, too; I'm not going to be able to devote full attention to it live.

Boston 110, New York 106

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Last night's game against the Knicks lacked the defensive intensity that has been a Boston trademark over the last two-plus seasons, but despite the the fact that is was close throughout the second half, it was also one of those games where I felt we were never in any danger of losing. That seemed to be the team's attitude, too, after scoring 38 points in the first period. Once that happened, the Celtics seemed to believe that they could score at will. Fortunately, they were basically right -- rarely have I seen an NBA game with as many uncontested layups as this one.

Rajon Rondo led the team with 15 points and 16 assists, and Ray Allen had 24 points. He also contributed the game's key play, a blocked layup with under a minute to go that caused a shot-clock violation and preserved a three-point lead.

Boston was without Paul Pierce, who sat because of his injured thumb. There's talk that he'll miss maybe a week, which would keep him out of Thursday's showdown with Cleveland. (The Cavs, by the way, won their first game with Antawn Jamison last night, overcoming 37 points from rookie Marcus Thornton to beat New Orleans.)

The Celtics did, however, have Nate Robinson. Robinson's stat line is unimpressive and his impact on this game was minimal. However, the influence he could have on this team was apparent just from the way he flew around the court. Once he gets settled in and learns the offense and defensive schemes, he'll be a great addition, basketball-wise.

There was a nice moment when Eddie House came into the game in the first period. The Boston crowd gave him a standing ovation and several Celtics came over and clowned around with him for a second. House, of course, was the main price of Robinson. Another inclusion in that deal (along with J.R. Giddens) was Bill Walker, a RwH favorite who never really got much of a chance in Boston. Billy Sky threw down a thunderous dunk and drilled a three in about 13 minutes of playing time, his first floor time with the Knicks.

VIEWING ALERT: The Cleveland game is on TNT at 8 p.m. on Thursday.

Denver 114, Boston 105

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I've got mixed emotions about this one. We did lose, after all. We missed 11 friggin' free throws. And we played absolutely terribly defensively in the first quarter, and not that much better in the fourth.

But this game came at the end of a stretch of three road games in four days against some very tough teams. Maybe I'm still basking in the afterglow of beating LA (it lasts a bit longer out here), but I'm feeling okay about yesterday.

Most importantly, we showed fight, something we hadn't done much leading up to the All-Star break. This has been mentioned a lot in recent broadcasts, but just in case you haven't heard, the Celtics have lost ten games this year in which they held a double-digit lead in the fourth quarter. In most of those, Boston has just rolled over when the opposition got it going late.

That hasn't been the case in four post-break games, and it wasn't the case on Sunday. Trailing 37-19 after one period, Boston rallied to tie the score at 66 a little more than midway through the third. Unfortunately, as so often happens when you have to come back from a big deficit, it looked like we ran out of gas -- understandable, especially given our recent schedule. That, coupled with J.R. Smith's red-hot fourth quarter, resulted in a fairly comfortable win for the Nuggets.

It's hard to explain if you didn't watch or hadn't seen the Cs much before the All-Star break, but the team just has a better personality on the court right now. Fresher, more focused, more intense, more confident. Kevin Garnett looked great; Ray Allen spent a lot of time with the second unit and got us back in the game in the second quarter; and Marquis Daniels and Rasheed Wallace had effective games off the bench. Once Paul Pierce gets healthy and as long as Nate Robinson isn't a disaster, we'll start looking a lot like the team that started the season so hot.

A note on Pierce: The sprained thumb he suffered against Los Angeles on Thursday is apparently causing significant problems with his shooting. In some ways, it's encouraging news; it offers at least a partial explanation for the captain's 9-for-28 performance in the last three games. But the thumb can't take all of the blame. Pierce was barely any better (14-for-38) in the three games prior to the injury (before which he sat two games with a foot injury). Hopefully, he gets it all worked out soon.

Lightish week for Boston, with the important exception of the game against Cleveland on Thursday (TNT, 8 p.m. Eastern). Boston won in Cleveland on opening night, but the teams were different then: the Celtics' key guys were healthier, the Cavs were finding their feet (recall that they lost three of their first six games), and the Cavs didn't have Antawn Jamison, the power forward who arrived from Washington in a deadline deal. Jamison bombed in his Cleveland debut, going 0-for-12 in a loss to Charlotte -- and the team hasn't won since he arrived -- but it's safe to say he improves their team.

The Cs will warm up for that showdown with a game on Tuesday against the Knicks, which would be fairly un-exciting except that it's likely to be Nate Robinson's first game with the Celtics -- against his old team, no less. It also will mark Eddie House's return to Boston, which will be emotional, for sure. House, by the way, had 24 points off the bench in his first game with New York (an overtime loss to Oklahoma City).

Cs Lose House, Acquire Robinson

The Celtics have traded Eddie House, Bill Walker, and J.R. Giddens to New York Knicks for Nate Robinson and Marcus Landry.

This deal has been talked about for a few weeks, enough time me to formulate my thoughts on it -- and I've been bouncing back and forth. From a purely basketball standpoint, it makes sense: Robinson is a far more dynamic scorer than House. He's not as automatic from three-point land, though at 35 percent for his career and 38 percent for the year, he's no slouch. But you can give him the ball and let him take his guy off the dribble, something the second team has lacked in the KG-Ray Allen era. On the other end of the court, Robinson is small -- okay, he's really small -- but so is Eddie and, let's face it, we're not going to miss House's defense.

What we'll miss is Eddie's presence on the bench and in the locker room, his consistent effort, and his general leadership. What has some Celtics fans worried about this, I think, is that these are Robinson's weakest points. Eddie played 17 minutes a game and did his job without a complaint; Nate wasn't happy with 24 minutes per game in New York and will receive fewer than that in Boston. Eddie was Boston's biggest cheerleader on the bench; Nate sulked when he was benched basically for the month of December. Eddie's a likable guy; Nate's kind of a punk.

Here's the thing, though. As I just mentioned, Robinson played just 10 minutes, 33 seconds in December, before being benched by D'Antoni for the rest of the month. In his first game back on the court, Robinson hung a 41/6/8 in an overtime win over Atlanta, shooting 18-for-24 in the process.

Hard to argue with that.

Boston 95, Sacramento 92

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A close win against the 18-35 Kings, even in Sacramento, is nothing for an elite team to get excited about, but this game is a positive for the Celts, and not just because of the win. Boston reversed a recent trend of blowing decent-sized leads in the fourth quarter. Sort of. The Celtics led by 10 points in the first half and held an 82-75 lead in the fourth before giving up 12 of the next 16 points to go down one with 2:42 remaining. But they got a big stop after a Ray Allen miss, and then Paul Pierce -- the league's newest three-point champion -- nailed a triple from the top of the key to grab a lead they wouldn't relinquish. Sacramento helped Boston out by missing, I believe, eight fourth quarter free throws, but given our team's fourth quarter struggles over the past month and a half, we'll take the win.

Full marks to the bench in this one, which picked up a sluggish starting unit. Led by Rasheed Wallace's 17 points and Eddie House's 12, the second unit contributed 44 points, nearly half the team's total.

This was a chippy, physical game in which the two teams combined for 18 blocked shots, most of them around the basket. It's a tough way to start what will be a challenging week. Boston's got three more road tests this week, against some very difficult Western Conference opponents: In Los Angeles to face the Lakers on Thursday, at Portland on Friday, and at Denver on Sunday. Looking ahead to Thursday's contest with the defending champs, Kobe Bryant has missed the last four games, as well as the All-Star game, with a sore left ankle. Bryant, who is also battling a finger injury and possibly a bad back, didn't play in Tuesday's game against Golden State, but knowing him, he'll play Thursday.

VIEWING ALERT: Probably the only positive thing about playing three elite teams in four days is the opportunity for fans without League Pass to see the team -- if they're willing to stay up to do it. All three of the Cs' remaining games this week will be on national television: Thursday at 10:30 p.m. Eastern on TNT (Lakers); Friday at 10:30 p.m. Eastern on ESPN (Blazers); and Sunday afternoon at 3:30 p.m. Eastern on ABC (Nuggets). Be sure to tune in!

Boston 96, New Jersey 87

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Ideally, we'd beat the Nets -- now 4-45 -- by more than nine, especially at home. But New Jersey fought hard all night, and on the bright side, we saw Boston come through with a second consecutive decisive fourth quarter.

Eddie House's ten-point fourth quarter probably saved us. Other bright spots included Ray Allen's second-half shooting and 13 points off the bench for Glen Davis, just his fourth double-digit scoring game in 20 contests this year.

VIEWING ALERT: Orlando comes to Boston tomorrow for the teams' final matchup of the regular season (ABC, 2:30 p.m. Eastern). Paul Pierce, who has missed the last two games with a foot injury suffered Monday in Washington, practiced on Saturday, which makes it seem like he's more likely to play than not. We beat Orlando on Christmas Day without Pierce, but we'd obviously rather have him in the lineup. On the other hand, though a strained foot doesn't seem like the type of injury that will get worse, it's also not the kind of thing we want bothering him the rest of the year. If he needs to rest to get healthy for the second half of the season, I don't mind being shorthanded against the Magic.

TMJF: Happy 21st birthday, Jonny Flynn! The rookie point guard celebrated an hour or two early last night, scoring 19 points in Minnesota's surprising 117-108 win in Dallas over the Mavericks. Flynn, who will return to Dallas next weekend as part of the NBA All-Star rookie-sophomore game, also handed out seven assists against just one turnover.

Boston 107, Miami 102

Great stuff from the Cs last night.

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In the absence of Paul Pierce, who is out until at least the weekend with the strained foot he suffered on Monday against the Wizards, many Celtics stepped up. Rajon Rondo was masterful all night, finishing with 22 points, 14 assists, and six rebounds. Kevin Garnett had one of his best games of the year, with 14 points, six boards, and nine assists of his own. Ray Allen had one of his best shooting nights in a while, hitting 7 of 15 from the field on the way to a team-high 23 points. Tony Allen struggled replacing Pierce in the starting lineup, but was vital down the stretch, forcing Dwyane Wade into a very difficult jumper with just over a minute to go and then picking Wade on the next Heat possession, nailing two free throws on the other end to give Boston a five point lead with 36 seconds left. (Give Doc Rivers credit for making offense-defense substitutions down the stretch to keep Allen on Wade.) Eddie House chipped in 16 big points off the bench, and Rasheed Wallace (7 points) and Glen Davis (6 points) came up with big contributions for the second unit.

Most notably, Boston pulled away in the fourth quarter, taking control of a tie game and outscoring Miami 33-28 in the decisive period. I'm not at all saying that the team is better without Pierce on the floor, but his absence forced them to actually run offense down the stretch, and they were undoubtedly better off for it. Hopefully, this serves as a nice lesson for crunch-time offense when Pierce does come back.

Boston's next game is Friday, against New Jersey. Pierce may be back for the game on Super Bowl Sunday against Orlando (2:30 p.m. Eastern on ABC), though if they decide to sit him until after the All-Star break, I won't be upset. The Celtics beat the Magic on Christmas without Pierce, and moreover, while a game like this is important, it's not as important as making sure the captain is healthy for the second half of the season.

Orlando 83, Boston 78

I pity the beat writer who has to come up with a recap for this one. It was a game without a lede.

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We on the Boston side can play the "What if..." game, although it's more accurately the "How often..." game: How often are we going to shoot 2-for-19 from three-point range? Those on the Orlando side, however, can respond with "How often are we going to make just 15 of 26 free throws and commit 20 turnovers?" The statistical anomalies more or less balance each other out.

Really, it boiled down to the fact that Orlando had a stretch where their shots were falling (the first quarter), whereas Boston never really got going. That's it, plain and simple. Even as Boston cut a 16-point first quarter deficit to one just before halftime, I never felt confident in our ability to score on a given possession. Nor could I really say how we ended up scoring 29 points in that period. Some free throws here, a basket in transition there, a jumper or two sprinkled in. The offense just never was clicking. The same was true after we went down 66-57 late in the third. We came back to tie the score at 78, but it took nearly a whole quarter to do it. Holding a team as good as the Magic to 12 points in 11 minutes is a terrific defensive effort, but scoring just 21 points during that stretch wasted it.

There are a couple of positive things to take from the game. Other than the first period, the defense was very good, which it hasn't been at all recently. Additionally, our two big off-season acquistions, Rasheed Wallace and Marquis Daniels, were arguably our best players tonight. Despite his terrible shooting night, Wallace had a major positive effect, grabbing 13 rebounds and making three steals in a season-high 33:38 of court time (he played the last 19 and a half minutes after Kendrick Perkins went to the bench with his fifth foul 4:30 in to the third quarter). Daniels' stat line wasn't nearly as full, but he made a lot of little plays that helped us get back in it.

Some quick bullets:

• Perkins picked up his fourth foul trying to draw a charge on Rashard Lewis with 8:47 on the clock in the third quarter. As mentioned above, he picked up his fifth a minute later, with Wallace at the scorer's table waiting to check in for him. Why do I mention it? Because Doc Rivers had two opportunities to get Perk out of there before he picked up his fifth (immediately after the foul, and when Rajon Rondo commited a loose-ball foul on the other end) and didn't do it. It probably didn't hurt us because Wallace filled in so well, but it's still a mistake that shouldn't be made.
• For the second time this year, Eddie House played the crunch time minutes in place of Rondo. I've been thinking about it for an hour or so, and I still can't decide how I feel about it. On the one hand, Rondo wasn't having much of an effect on the game and House's defense, normally a reason for Rondo over House, wasn't a problem. On the other hand, the big reason to play House over Rondo is House's outside shooting, which wasn't there at all tonight. The other argument for House is that his presence forces the opposition to play honest defense, and the rest of the Celtics got some good looks at three-pointers as Orlando ran at House on ball reversals; they just didn't knock them down. But House can't break down his man like Rondo can, and Rondo taking the ball to the basket often results in an open look for a teammate. Maybe I'd be singing a different tune if Wallace had knocked down a couple of the threes he took off of House passes, but I would've gone back to Rondo a bit sooner. We weren't hitting our jumpers and a still-hobbled Paul Pierce was having a tough time getting his own shot. We needed someone to create.
• On a related note, some of you are no doubt saying something to the effect of "No team should ever shoot 2-for-19 from three-point range" -- the idea being that if you're that cold, you should look for a different way to score. There's some truth to that, but the looks Boston got were by and large good ones. Orlando played pretty good defense, Rondo wasn't playing down the stretch, and Pierce really struggled to create for himself. Those were the shots that were available, and on a normal night, they knock enough down that it's not an issue.
• I thought Pierce did a very nice job of battling Dwight Howard on several defensive rotations, keeping the big guy out of scoring position while our bigs recovered.
• During the broadcast, ESPN's Jeff Van Gundy noted that Kevin Garnett tonight surpassed 40,000 career minutes. I hopped on to Basketball Reference to see where that ranked all-time (25th) and discovered something a little unsettling; among active players, Boston has four of the top 12 in minutes played. I knew we were old, but that was still pretty unsettling.

Boston 97, New Orleans 87

Our first subpar performance of the season.

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The Celtics may have fallen victims to their own early-season success a little bit in this one. Despite not shooting particularly well, they looked to have the game completely in control, holding a nine-point lead late in the third. Whether they let up at that point or simply couldn't find the killer instinct they had in putting the Bobcats and Bulls away I can't say, but letting a Chris Paul-led team hang around without paying for it. The Celtics' price for their lethargy was a much more difficult final period than it needed to be.

This one wasn't over until just over two minutes remained in the fourth. Boston went to a 3/4 pick-and-roll for three consecutive possessions. On the first two, Paul Pierce posted up Peja Stojakovic on the left wing, took an entry pass from Kevin Garnett, and then dribbled right over a screen from Garnett, forcing a switch. The ball then went to KG in the post, and the havoc this mismatch wreaked on the Hornets' defense resulted in in an easy bucket for Rondo cutting to the hoop and a wide-open three for Pierce after New Orleans triple-teamed KG. The last time we ran this action, Pierce took a high screen from KG and dribbled right. Garnett rolled to the foul line, took a pass from Pierce, drew Emeka Okafor out ever so slightly, and dumped it down to Kendrick Perkins for an easy two.

Bullets:

• The bench had a nice sequence starting at the end of the third quarter, after New Orleans had come back from down 12 to tie it. Rasheed Wallace hit a three with the shot clock expiring to end the period, then hit a little turnaround in the lane to again push the lead to three with a minute and a half gone in the fourth. Stojakovic tied it with a three, but Marquis Daniels drew a foul on the next possession. He hit the first free throw and missed the second, but he then combined with Wallace to tap out the offense rebound, and Wallace hit a three on the possession. Eddie House then sandwiched nice assists to Shelden Williams and Daniels around a Stojakovic triple, which gave the starters the cushion they needed.
• Rajon Rondo didn't have a bad game, but he made several mistakes in the fourth quarter: A bad pass, a dribbling violation, a gamble on Paul that used up Boston's foul to give, and an over-aggressive attempt to keep the ball out of Paul's hands that ended up putting CP3 on the line. He was hardly the only guy not at his best Sunday night, but he came down to earth a bit after his remarkable start to the season.
• Stojakovic nearly buried us with his outside shooting (26 points on 9-of-15, including 6-of-10 from deep). Pierce was on him a big chunk of the time and Stojakovic just ran him off of screens. Boston never really helped; it was as though they were totally unprepared for New Orleans to run plays for Peja. That may be forgivable, given how balky his back has been, but it sure was frustrating to see the guy who is fourth all-time in three-pointers made have so much daylight over and over in the second half. Boston didn't really make him work on the defensive end until the final few minutes, either, despite the fact that his cover, Pierce, had a very strong first half offensively.

A win's a win, though, and the Celtics move to 4-0. Next game is Tuesday night, at Philly.

Boston 106, New Jersey 104

A little slow posting this one from Wednesday night because I've been really busy this week.

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Beating the Nets is no great accomplishment, but it is an important one, as Orlando is still hot on Boston's heels for the second spot in the East as the season's final week approaches.

The good: 31/5/9 from Rajon Rondo; 15 bench points from Eddie House; nine and nine from Mikki Moore; four points and five assists from Stephon Marbury in his best all-around game as a Celtic.

The bad: A 31-point first quarter by the Nets; an inconsistent defensive effort all night; and two poor trips up-and-down in the final minute that gave the Nets a shot to win after having trailed 106-99.

Next game is Friday night, at home against Miami (no national TV).

Boston 99, Atlanta 93

This game was broadcast on NBATV, so I can comment only on what I can glean from the box score.

[recap] [box score] [highlights]

Kevin Garnett sat this one out with soreness in the knee that had kept him out for the past month or so. It's unclear, at this point, if he'll play Sunday against Oklahoma City, but I wouldn't count on it, even though the discomfort was so minor that Garnett reportedly didn't see a doctor. This also probably sets back his timetable for returning to full service. He'd averaged about 16 or 17 minutes in his four games back, and was reportedly set to play another eight per game starting next week. They've been very cautious -- perhaps overly so -- in bringing him back, so I would expect a full night out of Garnett until the playoffs. I'm not yet concerned about him not being full-strength for the playoffs, but it's something to keep an eye on.

With Garnett and Leon Powe out, heavy responsibility -- along with the start -- went to Glen Davis, and he responded in a big way with 19 points, tying a career-high with 12 rebounds. But the man they call Big Baby was just one of a handful of second-team players who came up big Friday night. Eddie House led the way with 12 points off the bench, and Stephon Marbury finally found his shooting stroke, hitting three of four three-pointers on his way to 11 points, his high since joining the Celtics 15 games ago. Hopefully Marbury, who has struggled mightily with his jumper, will get a little rhythm going. Mikki Moore had ten rebounds in 30 minutes, his playing time increased because Kendrick Perkins played just 21 minutes before fouling out.

Boston also put in a solid defensive effort, an encouraging sign for a team that really struggled on that end of the floor without Garnett. The Hawks shot 42% for the game and scored only 60 points through three quarters.

Ray Allen and Paul Pierce had 22 and 21 points respectively, but this one's a loss without the play of the second team. Perkins and Rajon Rondo had off-nights, KG and Powe were out, and the second team stepped up and filled their shoes, on the road, against the fourth-place team in the East.

Boston 89, New Orleans 77

Nice to rebound from a couple of home losses to Western teams with a win on the road. We'll try to do the same thing tonight in Dallas at 9:30 pm Eastern (VIEWING ALERT) on TNT.

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This game was really ugly through three quarters, and it didn't get much prettier in the fourth, except on the scoreboard. And it was the bench that did it for the Celtics. Tied at 64 heading into the fourth, it was seven and a half minutes before any of the Big Three (reduced to the Big Two due to a thumb injury to Ray Allen; more on that later) made a bucket in the fourth. By that time, Boston had a ten point lead. Glen Davis had a couple of buckets, but give most of the credit here to Eddie House and Leon Powe. House had eight of his 12 points in the fourth; Leon had seven of his 11 in the period. Good stuff from both of those guys. It's been a while since Leon's had this kind of game. Here's hoping he keeps it up, and Doc lets him.

So, yeah, Ray hyperextended his thumb somehow in the first quarter, and didn't play in the second half. He says he's going to try to play tonight, but he also said that he couldn't grip a ball last night, and I don't see how that's going to change in less than 24 hours. This will leave us awfully thin in the backcourt, as Tony Allen didn't even make the Texas trip with his own thumb injury. In Ray's stead last night, Gabe Pruitt started the second half, though House was clearly the more effective player. Still, it's hard to see a Rondo-House backcourt being able to effectively defend the much taller Dallas guards (Jason Kidd is 6'4", Antoine Wright is 6'7"). I imagine that if Ray can't go, Pruitt will start, and Rondo will probably go close to the full 48.

This injury also might affect Ray's ability to play in the All-Star game, his nomination to which I keep meaning to write about, but also keep running out of time. I am out of time now, as well. Maybe over the weekend.

Finally, having had League Pass for a year-plus now, I've heard most NBA teams' announcing crews, and none is more annoying than New Orleans'. I don't know how Bees fans listen to these guys every night. It's not just that they're biased, though they are. Most announcers for halfway decent teams are; I think the only team this year I've heard whose announcers aren't biased are the Sacramento Kings. Besides, it would be a bit hypocritical for a Boston fan to hate on biased announcing, as Tommy and Mike are the worst (best?) when it comes to that.

No, these guys were just flat-out annoying, the kind of people you roll your eyes at when you spot them from afar at a party. The color analyst is always making terrible jokes; I like a good (or bad) pun more than most, but there are only so many times that you can talk about Leon's "Powe-tential." The play-by-play guy is always encouraging these jokes, and I also thought he went a little overboard on a couple of crossovers by Chris Paul. They were nice moves, but not the anklebreakers this guy said they were, and besides, the guys whose ankles were allegedly broken - Gabe Pruitt and Eddie House -- aren't exactly institutions of the NBA All-Defensive Team. (For his part, the color analyst told Gabe Pruitt to "Dust your keister off, because he just dusted you!" after Paul took him to the cup. Ugh.) And the sideline reporter takes his job waaaaaaaaay too seriously. They do a promotion where the fans get to ask the broadcasters questions, and last night's question was "Which team besides New Orleans has the best chance to win the championship?" and while I actually can't remember what the sideline guy's answer was, he put way too much explanation in it for being a sideline guy.

Also, last night's trivia question for the NO fans was "Which Hornet won a championship with Boston last year?" and it was multiple choice -- and somehow 12 percent of the people texting in the answer got it wrong.

I'm convinced that those 12 percent were taking advantage of an ingenious plan a few of my friends and I dreamed up at a Clippers game this season. They have a promotion where you text the answer to a question they post on the JumboTron and you have a chance to win prizes, and we figured that we would just text a random letter (A, B, C, D) every night there was a Clippers game around the time they usually put the question up. Alas, you have to be present at the game to win - I think you have to go to some booth or something.

Los Angeles Lakers 110, Boston 109 (OT)

First, all credit to the Lakers. Third game in four days at the end of a road trip and they played a lot tougher than they did in last year's Finals.

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You could blame the officials for this one. You could put it on Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen being slowed by the flu. I point directly at Doc Rivers.

After Lamar Odom hit a couple of free throws to put the Lakers up by one in overtime with 16 seconds left, Boston called a 20-second timeout. Here's the lineup Doc came up with: Paul Pierce, Ray Allen, Rajon Rondo, Glen Davis, and Kendrick Perkins. To be fair, Davis was in the game because Garnett had fouled out with a few minutes left in regulation.

The first problem I have with this lineup is: NO EDDIE HOUSE!

Never mind the fact that Eddie was the only guy who had his jumper going (4-for-6 from deep), or that he has killed the Lakers the last season and a half, or that the guy he would have replaced, Davis, was having a terrible shooting night. We needed Eddie in to space the floor.

KG was out, and Rondo and Perkins are limited offensively to the point where you don't have to worry too much about them. Davis was having an awful game. The Lakers were able to focus their defensive energy on Pierce and Allen, and neither had room to operate. Eddie would open up the court more, and of course he's very dangerous if the Lakers happened to leave him open.

Secondly, in the absence of House, Doc chose to play Davis instead of Leon Powe. I've been ranting about Doc's choice of Glen Davis over Leon Powe for a while now, and last night it finally came back to bite us. I remember writing a few weeks ago that while Davis might have the potential to produce a little more on a given night, he also has the potential to shoot us out of any game. Last night, though he did make one big jumper, he did almost exactly that, going 1-for-8 from the field. I've said something similar before, but I'll say it again: Glen Davis should never go 1-for-8 in an important game on this team.

What was especially infuriating about watching Davis clang shot after shot down the stretch (while getting abused by Lamar Odom -- an admittedly tough cover for Davis -- on the other end) is that Doc finally let Leon Powe out of purgatory and Powe responded with 10 points and eight rebounds in 16 minutes (on 5-of-7 shooting). And yet it was Davis who played the crunch-time minutes.

Anyway, I'm pretty sick of talking about this game. Very good win for the Lakers. We'll see what implications it has. The one obvious one is that were the two teams to meet in the Finals after posting the exact same overall record during the regular season, the Lakers would get homecourt advantage. That would be very important should it come to pass, but I'm not too worried about it. The odds of two teams ending with the same record aren't great to begin with, and I have to figure that the Lakers are going to lose a couple here and there that they would have won with Andrew Bynum. The other consequence would be confidence on the part of the Lakers, since they've now won in a building they couldn't win in last June.

The Celtics will try to start a new winning streak when they play New York tonight. Next natioanl TV game is San Antonio on Sunday, at 1 pm. Eastern, on ABC.

Boston 119, Sacramento 100

Seriously, it's getting difficult to write when every game is a blowout. Not that I'm complaining.

[recap] [box score] [highlights]

Sluggish start, followed by a 40-19 second quarter that put the game effectively out of reach.

Quick notes:

-Eddie House is shooting the hell out of the basketball right now. In three of his last four games, he has gone over 20 points, doing most of his damage -- as he is wont to do -- from behind the arc. A then-career high seven threes (out of 11 attempts) against Miami on January 21; an identical deep shooting performance against Dallas on Sunday; and then eight-for-nine from downtown last night. Throw in his zero-for-one from Orlando, and over the last four, he's hit 22 of his last 32 triples -- 68.8 percent. I remember hearing (unsubstantiated) rumors a few weeks back that Danny Ainge was after Orlando's J.J. Redick because we needed a shooter off the bench; so much for that. (I can't quite put my finger on it, but the thought of Kevin Garnett

-Leon Powe got some run tonight, but Brian Scalabrine was out after suffering two concussions in three days. He got one against Dallas, apparently, and then was fragged by Patrick O'Bryant during Tuesday's practice. I feel bad for Scal, because they showed an interview with him on last night's broadcast, and he looked really disappointed. I don't blame him; the guy finally gets some real playing time and sheds his victory-cigar role (though the fans still implore him to shoot every time he touches the ball0, and then he gets knocked out of the lineup for a week or 10 days. It's only a few games, but when Doc Rivers is your coach, a lot can happen in those few games. He could lose minutes back to Powe, or Doc could forget his name or that he's on the team, or could decide that Patrick O'Bryant needs more PT, or that Sam Cassell would make a good power forward.

Leon missed two dunks tonight. I told you he was out of rhythm.

-Tony Allen returned to the lineup tonight, and played very well. driving, dishing, playing under control. Tony plays well just often enough that I can't bring myself to say, "Screw it, let's trade this guy for whatever we can get," but is generally so inconsistent and dumb on the court that I can't bring myself to like him, either. In truth, we can't really get rid of him, because he's our main backup on the wing and he's the guy on the second team who can create his own shot (I know, I've said this all a million times), but man, does he drive me crazy. Here's hoping that he wasn't really injured during his 11-game hiatus, but was at some basketball IQ camp with Gerald Green for three weeks, learning how to play the game.

-Paul Pierce picked up three fouls in the first quarter and had a blah scoring night, which is awesome for one of my fantasy teams. I'm playing the best team in the league and should win in rebounds and blocks (I have Shaq and Samuel Dalembert), while he's good in assists and steals (he has Chris Paul, and my guards are of the scoring type). Points will be the deciding category. Pierce's off-night is added to an off-night from Vince Carter to begin the week (though VC bounced back nicely last night) has him slightly off the projected pace, while I'm bolstered by Mo Williams' 43 two nights ago against Sacto. I just might be able to squeeze out a 3-2 win, giving me the all-important psychological edge as we look ahead to the playoffs.

Not that you care.

You might care, though, that the Celtics' next game is Friday night in Detroit, on ESPN at 7 p.m. Eastern. The Pistons seem to really be struggling this year, and have recently moved Rip Hamilton to the bench to make room for Rodney Stuckey in their lineup alongside Allen Iverson. Still should be a good game, as these teams are rivals, it's always fun to watch Iverson, and Stuckey's an intriguing young player. And there's always a strong possibility that Rasheed Wallace will pick up a technical foul -- he leads the league with 12 and is well on his way to the suspension threshhold of 16.

Plus, there's always a chance that Hamilton will kill somebody on the court, then turn to the ref and complain that he was fouled.

Boston 98, Miami 83

Eddie!

[recap] [box score] [highlights]

Constitutional Law is, thus far, kicking my ass this semester, so once we looked to have gained control of this one by halftime, I tuned out a bit. I remember Eddie House going for 20 points in the second quarter; I remember the Heat getting to with 11 or 12 or 13 in the fourth; and then the next time I looked up, we were leading by 22. The box score tells the story of this one: House and Ray Allen combining for 18-of-27 from the field, including 12-of-17 three-pointers. Fifteen total triples. Most of the times you shoot over 50 percent from the field, and make 60 percent of that many threes, you are going to win handily, even if you turn it over 21 times.

The defense wasn't superb tonight, at least not in the first quarter. There was a particularly sloppy stretch where Miami missed layups on like three straight possessions, including Shawn Marion clanging a dunk. (Incidentally, Marion is coming off of a groin injury and was limited to eight minutes). We still aren't playing as tight on that end this year as we did last season.

Still, nothing but good things came out of this one, which we need, heading into Thursday night's showdown (VIEWING ALERT: TNT 8 p.m.) with the Orlando Magic, suddenly a real contender not only in the East, but for the title. Perhaps the best thing was that we got Kendrick Perkins back. As well as Brian Scalabrine played in Perk's stead, and as good a job as Kevin Garnett did on Shaquille O'Neal Monday night, Perkins will be key to slowing Orlando's monster center, Dwight Howard. Howard is too strong for Scal and KG doesn't have a quickness advantage over Howard the way he does over Shaq. We need Perk's beef against Howard. Perkins only played 22 minutes tonight, in roughly six minute intervals, which was the plan coming in as he recovers from a tweak to his recurring shoulder injury. I wouldn't expect the plan to be any different against the Magic, so expect another 20 minutes or so from Scalabrine, if he can go that long without fouling out against Howard.

This one is a must-see for Boston fans, and probably for NBA fans, as well.

New York 100, Boston 88

I only caught bits and pieces of this one, but I didn't like too much of what I saw.

[recap] [box score]

I didn't like to see Kevin Garnett tweak his calf (although the pass he threw on that play was gorgeous, and I challenge anyone to name another 7-footer in history who throws that pass).

I didn't like to see Ray Allen going 0-for-9 from deep.

I didn't like to see Rajon Rondo playing only 26 minutes. Eddie House came in for Rondo with 3:26 remaining in the third quarter and the Celtics down 70-62; Rondo didn't re-enter the game until 2:54 was left in the game, with Boston down 93-86. I know Rondo wasn't very effective last night, but along with Paul Pierce (who played well), he's the only guy we have who can get the offense going when jumpers aren't falling. Eddie wasn't really hitting last night. It was clear we needed an offensive spark, and when we need an offensive spark, Rondo shouldn't be on the bench. (This is an argument, by the way, for why Stephon Marbury wouldn't be such a bad fit for us. His ability to create for himself and others is unmatched on our second team, with the possible exception of Tony Allen, who I'm trusting less and less these days.)

It wasn't all bad. I thought Scalabrine played as well as he's played this year, though we could have used a couple of the open jumpers he missed (he certainly wasn't alone in missing open jumpers last night, though). He was quite effective defensively.

Really, this one wasn't as bad as it looked. I don't want to make excuses and I'm sick of doing so, but if we hit a couple of jumpers -- open jumpers -- it's a different ballgame. The Knicks didn't play that well defensively -- they played well, for them, but that doesn't mean a whole lot, given that they allow a league-worst 48 percent shooting from opponents. We had open looks, but with the exception of Pierce, simply couldn't get anything to go down. And the Knicks caught a couple of breaks in the fourth quarter, getting easy buckets on possession where we played good D only to have the loose ball fall directly to them.

Cleveland lost to Washington on Sunday, so we're still percentage points ahead of them in the early stages of the race for homecourt advantage (although the five-loss Lakers now have the best record in the NBA). The next couple of weeks are going to be a good test for us, as we have a Tuesday-Wednesday back-to-back at Charlotte and home vs. Houston ahead of the big matchup in Cleveland on Friday. We have road games at playoff contenders Toronto, New Jersey, Miami, Orlando, and Detroit later this month. I think we'll know the true state of our team much better then.

Boston 100, Utah 91

Late in posting this because of exams. But I took a much-needed break from studying torts Monday afternoon to watch the game against the Carlos Boozer-less Jazz.

[recap] [box score]

Quick thoughts:

-Career-high 25 points -- to go along with nine rebounds and eight assists -- for Rajon Rondo. What really set Monday night apart from his other great games this year, though, is that we ran the offense through him in the fourth quarter, trusting him with the ball in his hands with the game on the line. That's not really something we've done before, but if we can establish him as fourth option in the clutch, it will make our first three options that much more effective.

-With Eddie House out due to a death in the family, Gabe Pruitt got some run backing up Rondo. The kid responded in a big way, leading our bench scorers with eight points on a couple of threes and a pair of free throws. He played good defense and was the victim of a couple of poor calls (the officiating was as bad as I've seen it this year). I said in the offseason that I didn't think re-signing House or finding another backup point guard was as high a priority as finding a backup center because I had faith in Pruitt, and that hasn't changed, even though there's really no spot in the regular rotation for him, particularly since House has stepped up his game of late. But his jumper, his size, and his D make him a good fill-in for House and Tony Allen when they aren't available, and Doc should remember he's an option when the situation might call for it.

-The Jazz have two of my favorite non-Celtics in the NBA: Paul Millsap and Morris Almond. After starting the previous game as Utah coach Jerry Sloan looks for a solution at shooting guard, Mo got the DNP-CD against us, but Millsap kept the Jazz in the game with a career-high 32 points. I have been high on him since he came out of college, but mainly for his rebounding. I didn't realize that he had developed such a robust offensive game. It was a treat to watch his career day.

Viewing alert: Next game is Wednesday night at Atlanta (7 p.m. Eastern on ESPN). It sounds like Paul Pierce is going to give it a go with the knee injury he suffered in the closing seconds against Utah. If he can't go, we'll need someone to step up if we want our 16th straight win.

Boston 94, New Orleans 82

A good win over a strong team on a night we didn't play our best.

[recap] [box score]

The highlight reel found in the game recap has a couple of spectacular plays toward the end; 1) a steal by Glen Davis, followed by the 289-pound second-year player taking it 70 feet before dishing to Tony Allen (who provided a great finish while getting fouled -- pretty much the only thing he did right all night); and 2) a sweet give-and-go alley-good between Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen. Otherwise, this one was kind of ugly. Boston out-toughed New Orleans, although some of that is because the Hornets were without their starting center, Tyson Chandler, who hurt his neck in practice.

I though Davis and Leon Powe played very well, despite their modest stat lines. Eddie House provided the outside shooting we needed to put the game away. And it was good to see Paul Pierce, who had 13 of his 28 in the decisive third quarter, step up and play the kind of offensive game we know he's capable of but hadn't seen from him in a while.

Although Chris Paul had 20 points and 14 rebounds, that's really a deceptive stat line; the Celtics did a nice job of containing him all night. Holding a guy like Paul to five made field goals is an indication of why we are so good defensively; we stop the other team's star player from getting to the basket. A few times, it broke down a bit, as we left guys open under the basket in an attempt to keep Paul away from the tin, and he found them for easy layups. But our defense certainly frustrated Paul, whose overlooked dirty streak -- remember, he was suspended a game in college for punching Julius Hodge in the groin, something everyone seems to forget about -- came through late when he set a fairly vicious illegal screen on Kendrick Perkins (Perk did a nice job not reacting to it).

Fourteen in a row now, and Cleveland is still hot on our heels. Next game is Monday night vs. Utah (7:30 p.m. Eastern; no national TV). The Jazz have another great young point guard in Deron Wililams, but our job against him will be a little different. He doesn't drive to score as much as Paul does, so we'll need to jump the screen-and-roll a bit more to keep him from shooting if Rondo goes behind the screens, rather than sagging back and daring him to shoot outside, the way we do with Paul.

Denver 94, Boston 85

All that falling behind and catching up finally caught up with us.

[recap] [box score]

I missed most of the first half -- yay, exam review! -- and so I didn't see Ray Allen's big first quarter or us lose the lead. I did see us dig ourselves into a huge hole and then climb out of it, which has become standard recently.

I'll admit that once we got going in the second half, I thought we had it wrapped up. Eddie was hitting, the crowd was going crazy, and Denver appeared to be coming unglued. But we couldn't score the big bucket that we needed to make it a two-possession lead.

Frankly, I think we just wore out. It's been a long week, starting with the win in Detroit on Sunday., We had to expend tremendous energy to come back from big deficits to beat the Raptors on Monday and the Hawks on Wednesday. Paul Pierce, who played 90 of a possible 96 minutes in those two contests, looked especially beat: Down two with eight minutes to play, Pierce had the ball on the left wing. Denver brought Kenyon Martin over to double, and Pierce just didn't have the energy to protect the ball. Martin swiped it from him, Linas Kleiza converted the three-point play on the other end, and we never got any closer.

Of course, Denver was finishing up a three-games-in-four-days road trip, so all credit to them. They got the job done and we didn't.

I said before the game that I didn't care too much about the outcome of this one, and I still don't. We won the games we needed to this week. Sure, it's discouraging to lose a first-quarter lead and not put the game away when we were in position to do so late. But it's a long NBA season, and nights like this happen.

We're in Milwaukee tonight. The Bucks are terrible, but we've got to be exhausted. This is a game I could easily see us losing if we hadn't lost to Denver Friday night -- a trap or letdown game, if you will. Dropping one to the Nugs may have caught our attention, however, so I expect a stronger effort than one might expect from a team playing it's fifth game in seven days. The bench played very well against Milwaukee in a win earlier this year, but after a strong game in Detroit, has gone pretty much AWOL over the last three (with the exception of House finally finding his stroke last night). House, Leon Powe, Tony Allen, and Glen Davis are going to be important if the Cs are to win tonight.

Boston 103, Atlanta 102

You gotta hand it to the Hawks. Those guys are legit.

[recap] [box score]

Atlanta had every reason to give up in the second half Wednesday night. Already without starting power forward Josh Smith, they lost backup Zaza Pachulia to a shoulder injury in the second quarter. A 44-28 second quarter lead had turned into a 51-51 halftime deadlock. Undersized and in the second night of a West-to-East road back-to-back, nobody would have blamed them for packing it in. Instead, they matched the defending champs shot for shot, and after Marvin Williams coolly banged in his fourth three-pointer of the game with seven seconds left, they looked poised to finally do what they couldn't manage last playoff season: win a game in Boston.

Of course, in the end, The Truth had the last word. (How does Pierce's buzzer-beater not make this list of the Top Ten plays from the night's NBA action? Here are the highlights. Pierce's shot is near the end, obviously.)

I said during the playoffs that if it weren't our run at a championship at stake, I'd love what the Hawks were doing. A #8 seed with a 37-45 regular season record, they pushed us to seven games, and did so with swagger and attitude, a disposition that they weren't going to be intimidated. (Remember Zaza getting after KG in Game 6? And just for the sake of nostalgia, remember KG's revenge in Game 7?)

Same story this year. Atlanta came in undefeated, but I don't think too many thought they were capable of playing as well as they did, at least under the circumstances. Joe Johnson, the former Celtics first-rounder who terrorized us in the playoffs, was at it again. He had 28 points, including two impossibly difficult shots late (as well as the drive and pass that found Williams for the go-ahead three-pointer). Williams, Maurice Evans, and Flip Murray poured in long jumper after long jumper.

The Hawks are no joke.

-Boston's gotta start making open jumpers. That was the difference between the Atlanta game being a blowout or being a nailbiter; Atlanta made their threes and Boston didn't. Eddie House and Ray Allen combined to go 2-for-16 from deep, and trust me when I say that they weren't particularly difficult looks. Atlanta hit far tougher ones in going 13-for-22 from the arc.

-The officiating was universally awful in this one. The late foul call on Pierce blocking a Johnson drive was an absolute joke, but it made up for a Boston possession a few minutes earlier when Pierce didn't get a shot up before the shot clock buzzer, but the refs let it go, and the play resulted in an offensive rebound and a bucket. Boston shot a few more freebies than Atlanta did, but given their size advantage, that's no surprise. The officiating was bad, but it didn't favor one team over the other.

-I'm debating whether to start a regular feature in this blog called "What I Hate Tony Allen." Tonight's exhibits:

A)End of the first quarter, we're holding for one. Tony starts his move too early, putting up his shot with six seconds left. It misses, and Atlanta has enough time to get the rebound and toss it upcourt to Murray, who drained a 26-footer at the horn.

B)Early in the fourth, Boston's up 81-80, as the lead has been going back and forth. Eddie gets a steal and Tony's bringing it up on the break. About ten feet from the basket, with no defender pressuring him at all, Tony, without leaving the ground, flips the ball, underhanded, at the rim, squandering an easy two. It was honestly the weirdest shot I've ever seen in the flow of a basketball game. Tony wasn't being pressured; he didn't go up in the air with the intention to pass and then, realizing his target was covered, throw up a shot. He simply decided that a finger roll without jumping from 10 feet was the right shot for the situation. Okay, Tony. Seriously, where do these 23-point games like the one he had against Detroit come from?

-I know I already criticized Ray for his shooting, but I'll criticize him for his poor defensive rotation on the possession that gave Atlanta the late lead. As Johnson drove under the basket, Ray was in position to step in front of Williams in the corner. Instead, he stood between Williams and Maurive Evans, who was out on the wing. It's possible he could have been trying to guard both of them, but Johnson was already up in the air and it was going to be very difficult for him to see Evans. Ray failing to step in the passing lane could have cost us the game.

-Pierce is an absolute joy to watch right now. He's on the short list of guys in the league you want to have the ball in their hands with the game on the line.

-Next game is on Friday, against Denver (8 p.m. Eastern, ESPN). I'd like a win, but I honestly don't care all that much what happens. Denver's a Western team we likely won't have to worry about in the playoffs. We did what we needed to do this week: Beat Eastern contenders Detroit, Toronto, and Atlanta in the span of four days.

I probably won't watch this one live, as I've got an exam review past tipoff and then I'm hanging out with a few folks to celebrate the occasion of an out of town friend being in town for work. I should be able to get to the Denver game (and the Milwaukee game on Saturday -- 8:30 p.m. Eastern, no national TV) at some point, and I'll post some thoughts late Saturday or Sunday.