Boston 100, Minnesota 79

[recap] [box score]

On Wednesday night, the Celtics beat a Utah team featuring Al Jefferson, the promising young center who was the major sacrifice of the deal that brought Kevin Garnett to Boston. After three years in Minnesota, Jefferson was traded to the Jazz before last season. Through nearly five seasons with two different clubs, however, Jefferson is still searching for his first win against his old team.

On Friday, the Celtics traveled to Minnesota and beat Kevin Garnett's old team, the team with which the franchise-altering trade was made in the 2007 offseason. Like Jefferson, the Timberwolves were looking for their first-even win over a Celtics team featuring KG, and like Jefferson, they didn't get it.

I didn't watch the whole game, but did catch the better part of the first three quarters, during which Boston led comfortably most of the way. KG was predictably over-hyped playing in Minnesota, but once he settled down a bit, the offense pretty much clicked on all cylinders the whole way. Boston shot about 49 percent from the field for the game, but if you remove Sasha Pavlovic's 0-for-5 (he was way off all game), the Celtics' percentage jumps to over 51 percent.

Avery Bradley, playing in place of the injured Ray Allen, was once again excellent, making six of nine shots from the field and five of six attempts from the line. I'm amazed at his offensive development; he's become a viable option off the ball, though he certainly benefits from being a secondary option. Rajon R-ndo controlled the tempo from the getgo, picking up a dozen of his 17 assists in the first half. KG (24 points, 10 rebounds) and Paul Pierce (21 and 9) did much of the heavy lifting. The Celtics got 20 bench points, though Keyon Dooling and Greg Stiemsma contributed 10 of their combined 16 in a 31-point first quarter.

For Minnesota's part, it's a bit unfair to judge evaluate them with their current injuries. Rookie point guard sensation Ricky Rubio (aka The Other Woman) is done for the year with a torn ACL; young big man Nikola Pekovic, who exploded on to the scene in February and averaged close to a double-double that month, has been limited by bone spurs in March and has missed the last six games; sixth man Michael Beasley has been limited by a toe injury that is submarining one of my fantasy basketball playoff runs; and backup point guard J.J. Barea, who has battled injuries all season after coming over from Dallas as a free agent, suffered a thigh bruise while amassing a triple-double against Oklahoma City on March 23 and hasn't played since. All of this leaves precious little around power forward Kevin Love, a budding star.

For those unfamiliar, in his fourth season, Love has become one of the league's best players, a tenacious rebounder with legitimate three-point range. As far as I can tell, he's more effective facing up than with his back to the basket, which may be why he struggled so much against the Celtics. Love seemed to struggle with both with KG's length and KG's comfort level on the perimeter. He was simply off all game, and his 5-for-18 performance left him nine points short of having the most prolific month, in terms of combined points and rebounds, in NBA history.

With all the injuries, the only other T-Wolf of note was rookie Derrick Williams, the second overall pick in last summer's draft. With Pekovic out and Love playing the five, Williams has been playing the four, but he's more comfortable on the perimeter and is probably better suited to the three. He's had a difficult week, but he did have a decent game against the Celtics. What surprised me, however, is how poorly he finishes in traffic. Confronted with a Celtic defender on several drives to the rim, he neither assertively changed course to get to the basket nor tried to draw the foul by finishing through the defender. Instead, he wildly altered his shot, missing more often than not. Hopefully that part of his game will develop.

And now, the best news. Boston won, and Philadelphia suffered a stunning 21-point loss in Washington to the Wizards, the second-worst team in the NBA. As I detailed in an earlier post, the Celtics faced an uphill battle against the Sixers for the Atlantic division crown and the spoils that come with it: the fourth seed in the East and a playoff series against a team like Indiana instead of a team like Chicago or Miami. We now hold a one-game lead in the division, and the unexpected loss by Philly chips a way a bit at the schedule advantage they hold over the season's final month.

The Celtics are back in action Sunday at 3:30 Eastern, on ABC -- against Miami.

Boston 94, Utah 82

[recap] [box score]

I don't know if I'm in a writing funk or what, but I've had a really hard time coming up with things to say about the Celtics lately. And the ironic part is that, if we're not playing our best basketball of the season right now, we've at least gotten great results. On Tuesday night, Boston beat a hot but tired Utah team. That gives the Cs a 13-5 record since the All-Star break, which -- if I heard Mike Gorman correctly on tonight's broadcast -- is good for third-best in the whole league.

The Celtics are doing it with defense, at least in stretches: In each of the last three wins, Boston's opponent has gone through extended periods of offensive futility. The effort hasn't been consistent, however, and all three opponents have gotten back into the game -- often fueled in part, as the Jazz were, by Boston's own stagnant offense. The defensive glass also remains a consistent problem. The obvious explanation for the strong defense of late is Ray Allen's absence: His replacement, Avery Bradley, is a lockdown defender, so it'll be interesting to see if anything changes once Allen gets back. However, Greg Stiemsma, who has proven to be a fearsome shotblocker in his rookie season, figures to have cemented a spot in the rotation for the rest of the season.

A day off, and then the Timberwolves in Minnesota on Friday. Kevin Love has been an absolute monster for them, and keeping him away from the offensive glass will be top priority. They've had some injuries to other key pieces, and this is a very winnable game. Philly beat Cleveland on Tuesday, so we're currently tied atop the Atlantic with them, but they're in Washington on Friday night to face the 11-38 Wizards. Therefore, a win over the Wolves is probably necessary to keep pace.

Boston 96, Minnesota 93

[recap] [box score]

I caught this one with my cousin and a good friend at the Dominion Brew Pub in DC, over many Oak Barrel Stouts. I was watching the game, but also talking and eating and drinking, so I have only a few thoughts:

• As expected, Kevin Love was a handful, scoring 12 points to go with 24 rebounds. I couldn't hear the sound at the bar, but I checked the stats on my phone at halftime and at the break, Love had 15 rebounds. Boston as a team had 14.
• Rajon Rondo had 16 assists against just three turnovers, but even bigger was the 14-foot jumper he hit to put the Celtics by three with 44 seconds left. It's not a shot we want him taking all the time (indeed, he missed a 17-footer with 11 ticks left on the next possession after Michael Beasley had cut it to one), but I do like to see him growing more and more confident with the jumper.
• Von Wafer played really well, scoring ten points and tying for the team lead in boards (with Paul Pierce) with six. I still don't see where he fits into the healthy rotation, but the least I can do is give the man his due when he comes up big in the interim. With Delonte West out and Nate Robinson continuing to struggle, Wafer's contributions on Monday were invaluable.
• Shaquille O'Neal scored nine points in 30 minutes, but also grabbed just two rebounds (though to be fair, Love made it so that no Celtic's rebounding numbers were impressive). Jermaine O'Neal looked decent off the bench and blocked four shots. So far, it seems clear that he's better at protecting the rim than Shaq, when healthy.
• Glen Davis continued to emerge from a shooting slump, making seven of 15 shots. A little more consistency would be nice, but at least he's got a somewhat reliable offensive weapon in his arsenal now.

The Next Lamb: The Minnesota Timberwolves

Game 33: Minnesota (9-25) at Boston (25-7)
Monday, January 3
7:30 p.m. Eastern
NBA League Pass

You may remember that last year, I wrote a lot about the T-Wolves, and in particular their rookie point guard Jonny Flynn, one of my favorite college players ever and a guy I was convinced could be a terrific NBA player (I still am convinced, by the way). You may also have noticed that I've not written a single thing about Minnesota this season.

Part of it is that Flynn was hurt for the first month-plus, having aggravated over the summer a hip injury that cost him the final game of his rooke campaign. I have very little interest in the Wolves aside from Flynn, particularly with their front office having its collective head up its collective you-know-what and Kurt Rambis, the worst head coach in the NBA, at the helm. I appreciate super-rebounder Kevin Love, I'm interested in seeing what rookie Wesley Johnson has to offer, and Michael Beasley is on my fantasy team, but these are just secondary interests; my real focus is on Flynn.

But TMJF (The Marvelous Jonny Flynn, for those who don't remember) hasn't gotten much burn since he's been back in uniform, relegated to a backup role in favor of offseason acquisition Luke Ridnour. And without Flynn on the court, I just can't get myself to spend two-and-a-half hours three or so times per week watching the Wolves. There's too much good basketball to waste time watching bad basketball. (Though I'd still rather watch bad basketball than football or hockey.)

And yes, the Wolves are bad. Their record speaks for itself, but that 9-25 mark includes wins in three of their last four games. Whether this marks a real improvement in the team or is merely a momentary blip remains to be seen, though my hunch is that it's the latter.

I had planned to write, at some point this season, a post defending Flynn, talking about how he would have averaged a couple more assists per game last season if he had decent teammates on the wing; how Rambis' offense didn't take advantage of Flynn's abilities (or the abilities of any of their best players, for that matter); and how can make a pretty good case that Flynn was just as effective as Brandon Jennings, everyone's favorite rooking point guard, last season. I may still do that; I may not. But the writing seems to be on the wall for Flynn as far as Minnesota goes. Ridnour is ensconced as the starter (though I'd point out that the team is still 9-25) and the Spanish phenom Ricky Rubio is supposedly coming over after the lockout. Flynn's name often pops up in trade rumors, and I expect he'll be moved sooner or later -- though not if Minnesota doesn't give him some run to showcase him and increase his value (again, you're 9-25; what exactly do you have to lose?) When -- and if -- that happens, I'll start writing about Minnesota again regularly.

Anyway, on to the Wolves (who may be without Flynn on Monday, anyway; he missed Saturday's win over the Nets with a sprained ankle). Love is leading the league in rebounding at like 15 per game, including a ridiculous 31/31 game back in November. He's also averaging around 21 points per night, though on offense he's not what you expect from that kind of rebounder. He does his share of scoring inside, but he also hits three-pointers at around 44 percent. He's going to be a very tough cover for Glen Davis, and as will be the case with Boston's next opponent (San Antonio), the Celtics will miss Kevin Garnett quite a bit on Monday night.

Beasley was the biggest offseason addition. He went on a scoring binge earlier in the season and is probably the most dangerous Wolf (that looks and sounds funny, doesn't it?) with the ball in his hands. He still settles for too many long jumpers, and I suspect Boston will be perfectly happy to see him launch to his heart's content.

The infamous Darko Milicic has actually resurrected his career somewhat in Minnesota, though the thing he's really lacked is consistency. His shooting percentage is terrible for a big guy, but he's put up some big games. He's played poorly of late, and it seems like foul trouble has been a big problem. One area he has been fairly consistent in is shot-blocking; he's erased 2.4 shots per game this season, so Boston will want to be aware of that when going to the hole when he's in the game.

As for Ridnour, he's a good shooter and playmaker, a veteran who knows how to run an offense. On the defensive end, to my knowledge, he hasn't improved much since the day he was drafted in 2003, when Jay Bilas said that Ridnour couldn't guard the chair he (Bilas) was sitting on. Hopefully, Rajon Rondo shook off some rust Sunday in his first game back and can be an offensive weapon for the Cs on Monday night.

Catching Up

It's been...two weeks since you heard from me.

(Did I really just mark my return by paraphrasing a Barenaked Ladies song?)

Yes, two weeks without a post, part of which time coincided with a stretch where I was actually too busy to watch basketball, a concept I heretofore didn't think was possible (which may explain my poor GPA from the previous year). We've gone 4-2 in my blogging hiatus:

Boston 110, Memphis 105 (12/14) - Paul Pierce's 19 points led six Celtics who scored at least 13 in what I was told was a very entertaining game with a Grizzlies squad that is on the rise.

Philadelphia 98, Boston 97 (12/18) - The final two of Elton Brand's 23 points off the bench came on a tip-in with 7.7 seconds left, snapping Boston's 11-game win streak. I didn't get a chance to watch this one, either, but we had a 15-point lead in the third quarter, not the kind of margin we typically blow at home. Also, Rasheed Wallace was ejected for the first time this season.

Boston 122, Minnesota 104 (12/20) - I was supposed to watch this one in person but, as the folks at Delta/Northwest are about to find out, I missed it due to some serious ineffeciencies and incompetencies in their systems. Pierce had 29 points to lead seven Celtics in double figures, and made all six of his three-point attempts. Minnesota's leading scorer on the night? Jonny Flynn, with 21 points.

Boston 103, Indiana 94 (12/22) - I was able to get to Beantown in time for this game, and for a while, it hardly seemed worth my effort: The Cs trailed by 15 at the break. Despite playing without Kevin Garnett, who suffered a thigh bruise in the Minnesota game and was a late scratch, Boston need just more than seven minutes to erase that entire deficit, then put the game away in the fourth. It was a truly dominant second half, as Indiana scored just 37 points in the final 24 minutes. (This was one of those games were Indy was throwing in everything for the first half, then got cold in the second.) Ray Allen led Boston with 23 points, and Pierce scored 21 despite missing his first ten field goals.

Boston 86, Orlando 77 (12/25) - Christmas Day 2009 was better than the 2008 version (when the Celtics lost to the Lakers). Boston avenged an early-season home loss to the Magic with this road win. Offensively, Orlando was about as bad as you'll ever see a legitimate title contender be, scoring just eight second-quarter points. Boston was only marginally better, grabbing a 38-27 lead, but it was enough to hold on when things returned more to "normal" in the second half.

A little bit of good news/bad news for Boston. The good news was that they won this game without Paul Pierce; the bad news was that they won this game without Paul Pierce. The Celtics captain has a knee infection and is supposed to miss a couple of weeks. That we won such a big game without Pierce is encouraging, but we missed him two days later (see below) and it's a little unfortunate that we go into one of our big West Coast trips without our closer.

This was the second straight game with the Magic that could be called an abomination offensively for both teams (or, more charitably, a masterpiece defensively for both teams), which stands in sharp contrast to games 6 and 7 of last year's Eastern Conference semifinals, when Orlando made just about everything they put up on their way to stealing the series. I don't have an explanation for it, other than that these are the two best defensive teams in the East.

This game was huge, though, in terms of home court advantage (never too early to start thinking about that).

Los Angeles Clippers 92, Boston 90 (12/27) - A frustrating, annoying loss, sure, but one that probably doesn't matter. For the second straight year, Boston lost to the other team from L.A. in an eminently winnable game. (Walking out of the Staples Center last year while being taunted by Clippers fans is a low point in my life.)

Rajon Rondo will end up shouldering most of the blame here: Tied at 90 with 1.5 seconds to go, he missed two free throws, then allowed Baron Davis to catch the ball too easily on LA's ensuing inbounds play (though Baron still made a very difficult fallaway for the win).

Offensively, I'm still deciding whether I liked the call on our final possession, an isolation for Rondo at the top of the key with the shot clock off. The issue wasn't whether he was going to beat Davis off the dribble; he had been doing it all night. The issue is what happens once he does.

What happened on this occasion was that Rondo found himself in the clear, the Clippers' help arriving late. As he went to the bucket, Davis reached back and grabbed his right arm, smartly preferring to send the 53% free throw shooter to the line than give him a relatively uncontested layup.

What might have happened is that Rondo, after beating Davis, encounters one or more Clipper defenders, and kicks to an open teammate on the perimeter (Boston had four decent-to-excellent options from outside on the floor at the time: Garnett, Wallace, Eddie House, and Ray Allen).

The problem with what did happen is that Rondo is a 53% free throw shooter and has not, to my recollection, ever found himself in a spot where he was shooting potentially game-winning free throws. The problem with what might have happened is that NBA players tend to waste too much of the clock before making their move in these situations, and NBA defenses are usually pretty good about rotating to the first open man (it's the second pass that usually gets them). So Rondo, having started his move late, might have found a temporarily open teammate, but their shot might not have been a good one, and they wouldn't have had time to make the second pass to someone who was wide open. A high pick-and-pop with Garnett or something for Ray Allen coming off screens is SOP for us here, without Pierce.

On the other hand, Rondo is our point guard and our future, and at some point, he'll have the ball in his hands more often than not in these spots. On the road against the Clippers in mid-December, with no Pierce and the score tied, isn't a bad time to start breaking him in.

It's a shame that Rondo missed those free throws, because he had played a very strong game to that point, and it came on the heels of a 17/13/8 performance against the Magic (he had points/assists double-doubles against Philly and Minnesota, his fifth and sixth in the first nine games in December). He's playing more consistently aggressively than we've ever seen him, and I hope this isn't a setback in his mindset.

A couple of notes on other players:

Tony Allen has now played nine games on the season, starting each of the last two with Pierce and Marquis Daniels out. While he still has caused me to roll my eyes at times -- he's almost always in the wrong place on offense, and left two midrange jumpers against Orlando short before rocketing a third off the backboard -- he's acquitted himself pretty well, averaging eight points and four rebounds, and hitting double figures four times. Last night against the Clippers was his best game back: 10 points and 10 rebounds in nearly 40 minutes, with four steals, including two late in the fourth quarter that really should have saved the game for us. I still think we're betting off trading him once Daniels is close to coming back (Pierce should be back by then), but I need to give him his due when he deserves it.

Glen Davis made his return to the lineup against Orlando, prompting my buddy Joel to send this sarcastic text message (I'm paraphrasing): "Glad Big Baby has stayed in shape while he was out. He looks like he ate Eddie House." Davis did nothing noteworthy against the Magic, but had eight points and six boards -- five on the offensive glass -- against the Clippers. He also threw in a running left-handed hook which, it goes without saying, is not what I expected.

In a related story, Shelden Williams got the DNP-CD against the Clips, his second in three games, which means it looks like his run as a rotation player may be coming to an end. He's still around to help out in case of foul trouble/injury/Wallace suspension, but with Davis likely to get more minutes and he gets back into playing shape (has Big Baby ever been in playing shape?), I wouldn't expect to see Williams take his warmups off before garbage time too often.

TMJF:

The Wolves have played seven times since the last time I blogged, and have gone 4-3 in those games. They're also on a two-game winning streak, their first of the year. I haven't had a chance to see any of it, except the 110-108 win at Utah in which Jonny Flynn wasted Deron Williams on Minny's final posssession for the game-winning bucket.

Stat lines from the seven games are below:

Wolves 110, Jazz 108: 29 minutes, 11-19 FG, 4-6 3FG, 2-3 FT, 28 pts, 1 reb, 5 assts. 1 stl, 4 TOs

Clippers 120, Wolves 95: 30 minutes, 3-12 FG, 0-3 3FG, 3-4 FT, 9 pts, 3 rebs, 3 assts, 3 TOs

Wolves 112, Kings 96: 26 minutes, 5-8 FG, 2-2 FT, 12 pts, 1 reb, 5 assts, 1 stl, 2 TOs

Celtics 122, Wolves 104: 31 minutes, 8-15 FG, 1-3 3FG, 4-4 FT, 21 pts, 2 rebs, 2 assts, 1 stl, 4 TOs

Hawks 112, Wolves 87: 27 minutes, 5-13 FG, 1-2 3FG, 5-6 FT, 16 pts, 1 reb, 2 assts, 1 stl, 4 TOs

Wolves 103, Nets 99: 37 minutes, 9-19 FG, 1-5 3FG, 3-4 FT, 22 pts, 1 reb, 5 assts, 4 stls, 3 TOs

Wolves 101, Wizards 89: 25 minutes, 2-12 FG, 1-2 3FG, 3-4 FT, 8 pts, 3 rebs, 6 assts.

Boston 109, Golden State 95

[recap] [box score]

Bullets!

• I don't have a good explanation for why Boston's half-court defense was so bad in the first half. One theory bouncing around in my head was that Golden State is full of good, willing shooters, and our defense is predicated on helping and forcing teams to take jumpers they don't want to take. For the Warriors, the concept of a shot that they don't want to take doesn't exist. But there were a fair number of uncontested drives to the basket can't be explained away, unless the Celtics over-adjusted and stayed too close to the shooters.
• I know that our top offensive weapons prefer to play away from the basket, but we need to start punishing teams for playing small. The Warriors, like the Pacers, were undersized, but the only player who seemed interested in feeding Kendrick Perkins in the post was Kevin Garnett. It surely feels weird to pound the ball into Perk with the other options available, but we needed to exploit that mismatch more.
• Paul Pierce still looks hampered by the knee injury he suffered late last week.
• Rajon Rondo took this game over in the third quarter, scoring something like 12 of his 18 points in the period. During one stretch, he drove for a three-point play, then found Pierce for a three-pointer on the next possession. Tommy Heinsohn: "That's Rondo being Rondo!"
• On the Warriors' very next possession, Rondo gambled on a Monta Ellis crossover, and Ellis blew by him for an easy layin. QED.
• By converting the aforementioned three-point play, Rondo broke a streak of ten consecutive missed free throws. The NBA record, in case you're wondering, is 13. The camera caught him yelling an expletive in relief. His confidence at the line has clearly been shaken recently, and I've heard and read some reports that his work with shooting coach Mark Price has him uncomfortable with his shot. If that's true, it hasn't shown in live action: He stroked a very confident looking three-pointer tonight, his first of the year. I've long felt that the problem with Rondo's shot is that he's so unwilling to take it, not that it's bad. Sure, his mechanics are messed up, but the ball goes up to the rim reasonably softly, and he hits enough jumpers that it wouldn't be an issue if a)he took more of them; and b)teams didn't magnify that reluctance to fire by playing off of him.
• As a team, Boston was just 17-of-27 from the charity stripe.
• J.R. Giddens played seven minutes tonight, and not all in garbage time: He got it in the first quarter. One point, one rebound, one assist, and one turnover. His most notable play was biting on a Corey Maggette shot fake at the end of the first half, sending Maggette to the line with a chance to tie the game heading into the break. (Maggette hit one of two, and Garnett's spinning, one-handed 70-footer after grabbing the rebound was waved off because it came after the horn.)
• Giddens was also far too late on a rotation at the end of the third period, as Ellis coasted in for an easy two.
• After Chris Douglas-Roberts' career-high 27 points last night against Indiana, I mentioned to a buddy that I wouldn't at all be surprised if Giddens' career point total never exceeded CDR's single-game best. Giddens' free throw tonight gave him seven points in 15 career games. (To be fair, that's in only about 41 minutes of court time.) Douglas-Roberts, meanwhile, set a new career mark of 31 points tonight in a loss to Milwaukee, adding 10 rebounds for his second straight double-double. I compare these two, of course, because Douglas-Roberts was the player Boston should have taken with the pick it used on Giddens. That was true the day it happened, and it's looking more and more true by the game.
• Because I wasn't blogging over the summer, I didn't get a chance to write about the draft and what I saw at Summer League. Allow me, then, a few words about Golden State rookie Stephen Curry. My concern about Curry coming out of Davidson was that he was simply too small to get his shot off consistently at this level. Those concerns were put to rest in Vegas, as I saw Curry bounce his way free for the same looks he got in college. The surprising problem, however, was that he wasn't knocking them down, hitting right around a third of his attempts. A shooting slump, perhaps, but nothing to worry about. He wasn't much better in the preason, however, and I began to get concerned. Thankfully, though he was a rather pedestrian 4-for-10 against Boston, he seems to be on track, shooting just below 49 percent from the field on the season, an outstanding percentage for a guard. His ballhandling and/or decision-making still needs a lot of work, as evidenced by the six turnovers he committed against the Cs. At least three more of his passes were deflected, too, so that total could have been much worse. He may simply not have adjusted yet to the pro game as it relates to quickness and length of defenders.
• I'll leave you with this Curry story: Friday night, the same buddy mentioned above went to MSG with a bunch of Davidson grads specifically to see the kid. After playing his prized rookie just under 30 minutes a game through the season's first seven games. Woyas coach Don Nelson sat Curry for all but 2:35 of the game against the Knicks. Curry went scoreless and shotless in his brief time on the court. On the bright side, my friend and his crew got to see Curry's first career blocked shot.

Boston 92, Minnesota 90

Doc Rivers won't like it. Most fans won't like it. But that's how I like my Celtics-Wolves games to be.

[recap] [box score]

I always want Minnesota to do well because they have Al Jefferson, one of the truly likable former Celtics, as well as Ryan Gomes, another Boston guy who was part of the Garnett trade and who I've loved since his freshman year at Providence. And, of course, they have Jonny Flynn, whose performance I'll get to in a little bit.

So, coming into the game, given that Boston was 5-0 and Minnesota hadn't tasted victory since a wild comeback in their season-opener, I was worried that this one would be a laugher. I even told a friend of mine who's a Wolves fan that I wouldn't really care if we lost this one, and I meant it. At least I think I did. Ultimately, I was pleased with the game: A night when the Celtics finally had to face a little adversity; a confidence-builder for the Wolves; and an eventual win for the green-and-white.

If I were a rabid Wolves fan (see what I did there?), I'd be awfully upset with coach Kurt Rambis. Either Minnesota doesn't have a single player who can play help defense worth a damn, or Rambis decided to introduce a defensive scheme on the fly without installing it in practice first. Either way, it likely cost his team the game.

Minnesota defended Rajon Rondo the way the Lakers did in the 2008 Finals, when Rambis was an assistant coach in LA: They sagged way off of him (never covering him above the free throw line), using his defender to double the ball or clog driving lanes. Eventually, the Celtics realized that leaving Rondo at the top of the key wasn't the best counter to this strategy, and started moving him around the basket.

My favorite action they ran to counter Minny's defense was to iso Paul Pierce on the wing, with Garnett on the opposite block and Rondo floating on the baseline. The other two men on the floor were up high, opposite the ball. Flynn, the designated free safety, was stationed just outside the lane on the strong side, keeping an eye on Pierce. Garnett came across the lane to set a screen on Flynn; Garnett's defender, Ryan Hollins, followed him (he had to, to keep KG from posting up Flynn); no one rotated down or over; and Pierce hit Rondo with a pass for an easy two. Rondo had 14 points in the third quarter, and a good portion of it came on plays like that.

The reason I think there's a chance that 'sota never practiced this before is because after every Rondo layup, Flynn's head snapped over to the Wolves' bench, as if he were asking Rambis, "Am I really supposed to just leave him back there?" I've never seen a player act this way, and while it may have just been some rookie frustration boiling over, it really looked like the team wasn't on the same page at all.

Bullets:

• I haven't written much yet this season about Marquis Daniels, but he's just a perfect player for us. He does a little bit of everything, which you can see from the box scores, and he takes the pressure off of whichever starter (usually Pierce or Ray Allen) plays with the second unit to be the primary ballhandler and initiator of the offense, which you can't see from the box scores. Brian Scalabrine's recent return allowed Doc to trot out a five-man bench unit (Daniels, Scal, Rasheed Wallace, Eddie House, and Shelden Williams) in the second quarter, and that group cut a 31-23 lead to 33-31 in about three-and-a-half minutes together.
• Perkins then replaced Williams and became the only starter on the floor, somethin I've fairly certain we haven't seen in the past two-plus seasons, at least outside of crunch time. Perk promptly dropped in a half hook over Jefferson off the glass, and Allen came in for Scal at the next stoppage. That's about all the "Perkins as Option A on offense" I'm comfortable with, but I'm encouraged that this experiment didn't have me staring in horror at my television, which it would have as recently as last year, before the playoffs.
• The bench gets the credit for this win: No Boston starter had a positive +/-.
• Boston had been shooting the leather off the ball to start the year, but they cooled off considerably on Wednesday, shooting just 44.6 percent from the floor and making only five of 19 threes. I had wondered how the team would react when the shots stopped falling -- in particular, whether Rondo would step up his aggressiveness. We didn't really find out, as Rambis' peculiar defensive scheme sort of ran our offense for us.
• As good as Boston had been offensively, they had been better defensively, and that also wasn't the case for most of this game. Minnesota shot 52 percent for the game, and everyone -- especially Oleksiy Pecherov, but also Gomes and Jefferson -- seemed to be making whatever the put up. (The exception was Corey Brewer, a unique but maddening player who cannot be portrayed any more favorably than he is here.) The D stepped up big-time when we needed it, however, allowing just one bucket in Minnesota's final eight possessions.
• Celtics play-by-play guy Mike Gorman kept pronouncing Minnesota journeyman forward Brian Cardinal's last name "Car-di-NAL," like he was from Ibiza and not Illinois. For God's sake, look at the guy. How do you think he pronounces his name?

TMJF: Stat Line: 33 minutes, 4-6 FG, 1-1 3FG, 1-1 FT, 10 pts, 5 rebs, 5 assts, 2 TOs.

Wednesday was probably Flynn's best game as a pro, though most of his stat line came in the first half, and those who didn't watch the game will blame him for Rondo's big offensive night. He stayed within himself most of the evening, his only real mis-step coming on a couple of drives to the bucket that resulted in a missed layup and a blocked layup. But he left Rondo in the dust on a number of occasions, a testament to his quickness. And he played more than twice as much as Sessions, a sign that Rambis was pleased with his play, as well.

The Marvelous Jonny Flynn

I'd like to introduce the first of two new features to Rhymes With Hondo this season,: Periodic posts following the Timberwolves' rookie point guard, tagged "TMJF," which stands, of course, for "The Marvelous Jonny Flynn."

An avid follower of college basketball for most of my life, I nonetheless do not have a particular team I automatically root for more than others. (I am, however, partial to the Big East, because that's the conference I grew up watching.) Rather, I grow attached to certain teams and players that play a style I like. My favorite college team, for example, was the 1994-95 Virginia Cavaliers squad that Junior Burrough and Harold Deane led to the Elite 8. My list of favorite college players includes bona fide stars such as Stephon Marbury (who in his lone year at Georgia Tech teamed with Drew Barry to form the most entertaining collegiate backcourt I've ever seen) as well as role players like Josh Pace, the sixth man on the Syracuse team that won the 2003 national title.

Jonny Flynn is, hands down, my favorite college player of all-time.

The Flynn bandwagon is rather crowded these days, but I can safely say that if I wasn't the one who chartered it, I was among the first to climb aboard. After an outstanding sophomore season, Flynn declared for the NBA Draft as a projected first-rounder with a shot at the late lottery. He shot up draft boards due to his performance in pre-draft workouts, including registering the best vertical leap (40") of anyone in the 2009 draft class. He was picked sixth overall by the Minnesota Timberwolves, and then performed so well at the Las Vegas Summer League that he was a legitimate contender for MVP. Add all of this up, and he's a pretty popular player these days.

However, I fell in love with Flynn well before that, the first time I ever watched him, in his second collegiate game at Syracuse, against St. Joseph's in the second round of the Preseason NIT. The previous evening, he had scored 28 points in his debut. Against St. Joe's, he made just one field goal, but it happened to be the game-winner.

That's now what caught my eye, though. What caught my eye was a pass he made on the fast break to Donte' Greene (now of the Sacramento Kings). I've never been able to find it on YouTube, surely because it wasn't flashy enough to earn highlight reel status. Here, however, is part of what I wrote after the game:

Flynn had the ball on a 3-on-2 break, and as he reached the top of the key, he glanced right, where Greene was fading out to the three point line. Flynn then crossed over to his left and put his head down, taking the ball hard to the bucket with a St. Joseph's defender on his right hip.

As he got to the basket, instead of throwing up a difficult left-handed layup or trying to draw contact, Flynn wrapped a pass around his defender. Seemingly out of
nowhere, Greene appeared, catching the ball and jamming it it one giant stride. And the foul.

Watching the replay, I could see that Flynn's vision of that side of the court was completely obstructed by the defender. He couldn't possibly have seen Greene cut to the basket -- I'm not even sure Greene initiated his cut before Flynn released the ball. Flynn made the pass with the understanding that Greene would be crashing the
boards in anticipation of his shot. Either that or -- and this is where it gets interesting -- he threw it to lead Greene where he wanted him to go, weighting the pass perfectly as to catch Greene in stride.

This is not the stuff of normal point guards. It's not even the stuff of very, very good
point guards. It's the kind of pass I haven't seen a college player make since 1994, the year Jason Kidd left California for the NBA. Yes, it was that good. I'm not saying Flynn's the player Kidd was and is, but he's clearly got a special understanding of the game. I'm excited to see what else he's got in store for us.

It turns out that he had a lot in store for us. For those of you unfamiliar with his game, he's a dimunitive point guard who is deceptively strong. He's not a sniper, but you can't leave him open, either: While he made just a third of his three-point attempts in two years at Syracuse, he hit 7 of 12 from behind the pro arc in Vegas. He's a slasher with the athleticism to finish spectacularly, and he absorbs contact well for someone of his stature. As I've mentioned, he has extraordinary court vision, and distributes with the appropriate amount of flair and enthusiasm, falling just short enough of showboating that the observer gets pleasure out of the joy with which he plays.

Perhaps most importantly for his career prospects, he is a true leader and warrior. In the epic sextuple-overtime victory over Connecticutin last year's Big East tournament, Flynn played 67 of a possible 70 minutes, converted all 16 of his free throw attempts, and led his team to victory despite the fact that it never held a lead in any of the first five overtimes. And in the final game of his college career, an 84-71 loss to Oklahoma in the Sweet 16, he was really the only Syracuse player to play well, despite suffering a painful back injury in the first half while trying to draw a charge from Blake Griffin.

His career is already off to a great start, despite the fact that he hasn't played a single meaningful minute. Flynn has been put into about as difficult a situation as you can put a rookie point guard in. The Wolves picked him right after they selected Spanish sensation Ricky Rubio, and could only watch and listen as Wolves president of basketball operations aggressively wooed Rubio (who eventually decided to stay in Spain for at least the next two years, to the dismay of many Minnesota fans). While Kahn expressed a vision of a Rubio/Flynn backcourt, few actually think such a pairing would be effective, and the two play the same position. It's not often that the sixth overall pick has to fight for playing time with another rookie, but Flynn never spoke out and let his play in Vegas do the talking. In fact, Flynn went so far as to say that he wished Rubio were joining the team this year, though because those comments came after Rubio's decision to stay abroad, it's hard to evaluate their sincerity. Flynn was similiarly positive after the Wolves signed former Bucks point guard Ramon Sessions - a rising star to some, a young guy who has maxed his potential to others - to a four-year deal, though the fact that Sessions played some shooting guard in Milwaukee means that Flynn's playing time likely won't suffer as a result.

How good can Flynn be? He doesn't have the size to be as effective as Chicago's Derrick Rose is going to the basket, and Rose is the rare player who combines that kind of size, strength, and scoring ability with a point-guard's mentality. Flynn's ceiling probably falls short of young point guards like Rose, New Orleans' Chris Paul, and Utah's Deron Williams - but not by much. I think he'll turn out to be the best point guard in his draft class, a talented group that includes Rubio, Sacramento's Tyreke Evans (#4 overall), and Milwaukee's Brandon Jennings (#10).

As excited as I am for the upcoming Celtics season, I'm equally as excited for Flynn's professional career to start. I am going to watch as many Wolves games as I can this year, and while I won't give them the treatment I give the Cs, expect fairly regular updates and analysis of Flynn's play in these pages.

Boston 109, Minnesota 101

[recap] [box score] [highlights]

So it turns out that I was completely wrong, and that flagrant-twos do not result in an automatic suspension. So while Kendrick Perkins' foul on Jason Maxiell Friday night cost him ten grand, it didn't cost him a game, and he was in action Sunday. That turned out to be a very good thing, indeed, as our frontcourt rotation was nonetheless shortened, as Kevin Garnett missed this game, as he is apparently suffering from the flu -- an illness that may keep him out of Tuesday's matchup with Philly.

(That's a striking example of too many ases - as'? Can't be! - that I'm going to leave intact as a reminder to continue to work on my writing.)

I overslept and missed the first 18 minutes or so of this one, but it appears that after a fast Wolves start, the Cs jumped all over the young visitors with a 33-20 second quarter that resulted in a 62-44 halftime lead. Minnesota came back valiantly, but Boston hung on behind 36/8/6 from Paul Pierce, assisted by 22 points from Ray Allen, 14 points (including a dozen in the first half) from Tony Allen, and 12 points from Glen Davis, who started in Garnett's stead.

Al Jefferson is a monster, by the way, and his 34 points and 11 rebounds kept an overmatched team's faint hopes alive. Anyone who thinks that Celtics GM Danny Ainge ripped off Wolves coach/GM Kevin McHale (a former Celtics teammate) is crazy. KG was the key player to last season and I don't think Boston wins the title with Jefferson in his place, but in locking up a 23-year-old (22 at the time) power forward who is a 20/10 machine, McHale got good value for an aging superstar who was too long in the tooth to be the centerpiece of the franchise. This isn't anywhere close to as bad as the trade the Lakers pulled off with Memphis to bring in Pau Gasol last year.

Speaking of the Lakers, the Gasol deal was in response to the season-ending knee injury suffered by Andrew Bynum last January. In a cruel twist of fate, Bynum was injured Saturday night during a win over Memphis, when Kobe Bryant fell on Bynum's other knee after a drive to the basket. Bynum underwent an MRI on Sunday, and the results should be known some time on Monday.

I think ESPN's Stephen A. Smith overstates the case a bit -- as he so often does -- in the link above when he says that if Bynum is done for the year, their championship hopes end. It certainly weakens them, but without Bynum, they are still by and large the team that made the Finals last year. Lamar Odom should flourish stepping back into his starting role, and the Lakers should still be the favorites to come out of the West even if Bynum is on the shelf for the rest of the season.

Even if Bynum comes back at some point during the 2008-2009 season, however, there are implications for the rest of the league. He is bound to miss at least some time, and the Lakers will undoubtedly lose some games they would have won had he been healthy. Those few games could be crucial, as the team with the best overall record in the league gets home court advantage throughout the playoffs, including the Finals. The Lakers have nine losses, tied for fewest in the league with Boston and Cleveland (Orlando is one back in the loss column, with ten). While Los Angeles probably can hang on to home court advantage throughout the Western Conference playoffs even if Bynum misses the rest of the year (San Antonio is currently five games back), they are in serious danger of losing home court advantage to whatever East team they might meet in the Finals. Home court isn't everything, but when teams are evenly matched, as they are this year, it can often be the deciding factor (Cleveland, for example, hasn't lost a single game at home this season).

Such is the world of the NBA: one team's loss is every other team's gain.

Next game for Boston, as alluded to above, is Tuesday at Philadelphia. No national TV, though clear your calendar for Thursday night, as the Celtics host the Lakers at 8 p.m. Eastern on TNT.

Technical Difficulties

Some non-fatal computer problems are keeping me from blogging these days. For the millions of you who rely on this site for all your Celtics information, we won at Minnesota on Friday [recap] [box score] and at Toronto yesterday [recap] [box score].

There. You're caught up.

Our next game is Wednesday vs. Golden State (7:30 pm Eastern, no national TV). Hopefully my computer will be better by then and I can watch and report (I'm writing this entry from the law school computer lab, where I watched the second half of yesterday's game).

Boston 98, Detroit 80

Another trouncing of the Pistons, again keyed by our bench. This one wasn't even as close as the final score.

[recap] [box score]

I don't really know why our bench steps up in the games it does. The second unit was great against Detroit like two weeks ago, fairly ineffective in five intervening games, and then again the deciding factor tonight. But I love the fact that we're winning these big games against quality oppenents while getting rather pedestrian efforts from the Big Three. I don't like that we are relying so much on Pierce and Ray and KG to beat the Atlantas and Torontos, but as long as our bench is there when we need it to be, we should be okay.

Rajon Rondo has been fantastic the last two nights. I want to write a longer post about him sometime soon, so I'll keep my comments relatively short, but we're so much better when he's playing like he has the last couple times out, aggressive on offense, testing the defense, distributing. 15/8/7 the other night against the Knicks, and then 18 points and eight assists tonight against the Pistons. When he's playing like this, we're very tough to beat. How we can get him to assert himself every night out remains a mystery, but it should be a priority.

Next game is Friday night at Minnesota (8 p.m. Eastern, no national TV). I love when we play the Timberwolves. So many of their players are former Celtics, so it's fun to see those guys play. Al Jefferson is blossoming into the elite power forward we thought he could be, and Ryan Gomes is one of my favorite Celtics of all-time. I even like Sebastian Telfair. Looking forward to this one.