Twoulves Tame Celtics: Minnesota 104-Boston 95

[wfcooper@tiac.com (Bill Cooper)]

	This was probably the best game that the Celts have played in
three or four weeks.  They attacked the basket from the start of the
game, and avoided falling behind by a large margin early (in fact they
led after the first quarter).  They continued that momentum throughout
most of the game.  But in the end the home court advantage, the refs
and the Twolves stars were just too much for them.

	If you watch the Celtics on a consistent basis you were able
too see that something was different from the start.  They went down
low to Antoine Walker, or drove to the basket on nearly every early
possession (except the ones where Chauncey got his hands on the ball).
The Celts took an 11-7 lead.  The Twolves cam back and gained the lead
at 14-13.  Minnesota built their lead up to 18-15, before Dana And Dee
scored the last 8 Celtics points of the period, leading the C's to a
23-20 lead.

	The second quarter mostly consisted of the clubs trading
baskets.  The Twolves got strong play from Kevin Garnet and were able
to take at 35-30 lead with about 4:00 to go.   Walker who had been
having a tough time scoring to this point, shook of his lethargy and
led the C's on a 6-0 run to regain the lead at 39-33.   Dana Barros
hit a jumper as the buzzer sounded to give the C's a lead going into
halftime 42-40.

	The third quarter was just ugly.  The Twolves went to the line
25 times, converting on 21 of them (the Celts shot 7).   Early on the
Celts built a 55-48 lead (the Twolves failed to hit a lot of the early
foul shots).  The Twolves went on a 7-0 run to tie the game (5 of the
7 came form the free throw line.   After Dee Brown (who shot the ball
superbly for the first 3 quarters of this game) hit a three with 2:00
to go the Celts and Twolves were tied at 66.  The Twolves ended the
quarter with an 9-4 flurry on free throws to take a 75-70 lead.

	Early on the Celtics had trouble getting much done on offense.
The only exception to this was Walker, who had a brilliant behind the
back feed of Knight for an easy layup, and then drove on Garnett and
jammed.  Despite Walkers efforts the Celts were still down 86-80 with
5:00 to go in the period.   With some more Walker offense and a Barros
3 the Celts pulled to within a point at 90-89 (2:50 to go).  Tom
Gugliotta responded with 4 points, as the Twolves went on a 8-2 run
to push their lead back up to 98-91 with 30 seconds to go.  The score
stood at 104-95 when the game was finished.

	For one of the very few times this season (actually this might
be the first) the Celts had more turnovers than their opposition
(16-13).  As all of us are painfully aware, given the Celts offensive
deficiencies that's enough to cost them most games right there.  They
still took more shots than the Twolves (FGA 89-67, FTA 20-48), but
that was nowhere near enough to overcome the FGA% differential of .416
to .478 or the Twolves excellent free throw shooting at .813.

Lineups: 
Celts:Billups, Mercer, McCarty, Walker, Thomas
Twolves: Marbury, Carr, Garnett, Gugliotta, Parks

Players:
Walker: A very fine effort by Toine.   Personally I would rate this
above the 49 point effort in Washington.  He didn't play all that well
in the first half, but came on strong in the second.  He made several
excellent passes, hit the boards hard and played solid defense against
Gugliotta.  He ended the game with 30 points (12-28), 14 boards, 6
assists (!), 2 blocks, 3 steals and 3 turnovers.  

McCarty: got 30 minutes tonight, I suspect because he was the best
matchup against Garnett (both Bowen and Minor had their problems).  He
is still taking far too many jumpers (he shot 3-9, 1-4 on 3's).

Billups: Rough game for Chauncey, with 8 points on 3-11 shooting, 2
assists and 2 turnovers in 25 minutes.  He hit a three early and that
seemed to ruin him for the rest of the game.  Although Marbury didn't
have a great game statistically (though he was certainly the big
reason that the C's press was ineffective), he did beat Chauncey
senseless on a couple of crossover moves to the basket.

Mercer: ineffective, with 6 points on 3-7 shooting in 24 minutes.
Just no one to get him the ball where he can do something with it.

Thomas: first start in the NBA, but nothing to crow about.  I think
Pitino may have given him the start in his return home.  He didn't do
anything at all memorable, scoring 5 points and garnering 2 boards in
his 19 minutes.

DQ: set new NBA record (I hope) with 4 fouls in 3 minutes.

Brown: Dee shot 6-10 and 3-5 on 3's to score 15 points in 24 minutes.
Of course Dee's had strong nights shooting the ball from the outside
before.  More meaningfully, he also drove to the basket on several
occasions and played a strong floor game.  

Dana: 16 points, 4 assists and 2 turnovers in 23 minutes.  Another in
a stretch of pretty strong games by Dana.  Might be the second best
player on the team right now (take that any way you want).  

Knight: With DeClercq sitting on the pine, he got major minutes (27)
and did some solid board work with 8, but wasn't too effective
shooting the ball at 1-5.  Had some trouble with Mighty (when he plays
against the C's) Tom Hammonds.

Bowen: very confused right now.  Did not take a shot in 13 minutes.

Minor: had a little defensive trouble with Garnett in the 1st half
(Kevin has 5 inches on him after all), but otherwise played reasonably
well.  For whatever reason he didn't get into the game in the second
half.  had 2 points and 2 boards in 8 minutes.

Edney: DNP????????  What did this guy do?

Coaching:  It's good to see Pitino trying to get the team to play some
kind of offensive ball in the first quarter.  Rick is so proactive,
it's hard to why he's put up with some of the nonsense that has
occurred over the last ten games.

	On the negative side of things, I think it's clear that the
Celts press is beginning to lose some of it's steam.  A major reason
is that opposing team (many of whom are playing the C's for the 2nd
time) are preparing for it.  Still, it seems to me that the Celts
aren't as committed to it as they were earlier in the season.   

Opposition Players of Note: McHale's Folly (?): There was some woofing
going on after the last game about Walker's having outplayed Garnett
in the last game.  Early on, tonight it looked as though Garnett would
do the same to Antoine on his home court.  Garnett played a strong
first half, especially shooting the ball well.  But in the 2nd half in
was all Antoine, as Garnett just disappeared from the court in the
second half (I think he scored wither 2 or 4 points).  He ended the
game with 20 points on 9-12 shooting, 2 boards and 4 assists.  

The Celts are now 17-22.  The Celts play Friday evening against the
Hawks.

Bill Cooper
wfcooper@tiac.com