Hawks Last to Fall Down: Atlanta 77- Boston 70

[wfcooper@tiac.net (Bill Cooper)]

	I'm ready for the WNBA.  Bring on some professional basketball
(in terms of attitude, if not remuneration).  Just another in the
endless parade of awful games this season.    The collateral damage
resulting from all the missed bombs in this game constituted a crime
against humanity.   The Celts signed a Damon Jones to a ten day
contract, as a backup point.

	I know this will reveal me to a hopeless curmudgeon, but I can
remember the day, when an NBA player shooting an airball was an
unusual sight.  I suppose they had more time to practice shooting in
the good old days, not having to spend so much time supervising their
investments.  The Hawks and The Celts combined to score 14 points over
the first 6:00 of the game.  The Hawks took a 12-4 lead before the
Celts scored 6 straight to make it 12-10.  Paul Pierce showed a spark
to his game on the defensive end, but he couldn't translate it into
points.  The Hawks led at the end of the first, 21-12 as the 2 clubs
combined to shoot 14-43, the 14 baskets exceeding their turnover total
by just 1.

	The Celts offense improved slightly in the 2nd quarter, mostly
due to 10 day contractee Damon Jones.  Jones hit a three and a nice
floater in the lane to pull the Celts to within 4 at 23-19.  With a
boost from Mercer, the Celts were able to tie the game with 5:00 to go
in the period (28-28).  The Hawks came back with an 8-0 run,
spearheaded by Steve Crawford (?), taking the 36-28 lead.  Jones put
up a couple more hoops to get the Celts to within 6 at the half
(38-32).  In fact, Jones was the only Celtic to score over the last
5:00 of the first half.  The pace of the 2nd was glacial, as there
were just 38 possessions. Despite that, the 2 clubs topped their first
quarter output of 33 points with a sizzling 37.

	The Celts came out at the start of the third like Pitino had
reminded them that one of the points of the game was to put the ball
in the hoop.  They scored on 7 straight possessions, and on a Mercer
jam, took their first lead of the game at 43-42.  The Hawks
immediately reacted with a 7-0 run of their own to retake the lead at
51-47.  The Celts came back to take a lead at 52-51, but the Hawks
scored the last 4 of the period at 55-52.  You could tell for sure
this was a triple witching game, when Ron Mercer got called for a
palming violation.  

	Some of the Celts really tried to pull the game out.  Pierce
scored 7 straight points to help the Celts take back the lead.
Potapenko hit a couple of jumpers from the baseline when C's
penetrated.  With 4:07 to go, Mercer made a brilliant drive down the
baseline, and  hit a reverse lay-up, using the rim to ward off
Mutumbo.  That gave the C's the lead 69-68.  On the next possession,
V.P. hit a free throw to put the Celts up by 2 (70-68; 3:30).
Blaylock came back with a drive to tie it up.  The Celts had two
chances to take back the lead, with a good jump shot from Mercer, and
a tougher J from Pierce.  Neither went down, and with 2:38 to go, the
Hawks played ball control.  The got 3 offensive rebounds to extend
their possession down to the 1:17 mark (it looked as though the Celts
had the ball several times, but it just eluded them).  The possession
ended with Long hitting a pair of free throws giving the Hawks the
lead for good.  After Pierce missed a forced turn around, Blaylock hit
Crawford for a three that put the game away.  The final was 77-70.

	Neither team shot over 40%.  The Hawks won the game because
they got to the line 26 times to the Celt's 10.  After the first
quarter, when the teams combined for 13 turnovers, they committed just
11 the rest of the game (C's 13, Hawks 9).  In general, the Celts
seemed intimidated by Mutumbo (who did not record a single block,
oddly enough).
 
Lineups:
Celts: Barros, Mercer, Pierce, Walker, Potapenko
Hawks: Blaylock, Crawford, Corbin, Long, Mutumbo

Players:
Pierce: Played with a little more spirit tonight.  Made a couple of
nice defensive plays in the first half, and then tried to take the
ball to Crawford in the 4th.  Had 16 points, 8 boards and 4 assists in
37 minutes.

Mercer: 9-22 shooting, 19 points, 6 boards, 4 assists and 2 steals in
46 minutes.  41% shooting was pretty robust in this game.  

Walker: After the game Pitino was insisting that Antoine was playing
hard tonight.  I just didn't see it.  Shot 3-12, had 4 boards, and 1
assist in 33 minutes.  Heck, he only had 1 turnover.  Toine could do
that in a quarter if he was playing hard.

Dana: a non factor.  Only took 4 shots, scored 2 points and had 4
assists in 32 minutes.  He certainly didn't do a bad job against
Blaylock, but when it counted Mookie got just enough offense to carry
the Hawks over the top.

Potapenko: Started off slowly, as the Celts tried to go to him in the
low post early (I don't know why).  He came on strong in the 4th with
a lot off hustle and a couple of clutch shots.  Had 9 points and 10
boards in 28 minutes.

Battie: Would have lost a game of horse to Chris Dudley tonight.  He
hit one nice bank shot, and a couple of dunks.  I bet none of his
other 6 shots even drew iron.  I doubt he could shoot that poorly on
purpose.  The rest of his game was as usual.  11 boards, 2 steals, 2
blocks in 29 minutes.

Minor: got 12 minutes.  Not much of a factor.

McCarty/Schinztius: got time when Pitino ran out of players.

Jones: What, was Todd Day busy?  Hit on 4-9 shots in just 16 minutes,
and did not throw a single pass (well...).  I swear that he didn't
even try to throw the ball to another Celt where he might try to take
a shot.  I'm sure Marlon Garnett was watching the game and thinking
that he could have done that: he thought the Celts wanted him to play
point guard.  Damon does do a decent job of maintaining his dribble,
and seems to give a good effort on defense.

Coaching: Maybe Pitino has given up on himself.  2 or 3 times in his
post game interview, he said that the Celts were trapped in a slow
tempo game.  Did Lennie shackle the C's legs together?  Rick was
certainly right about the tempo, why didn't he try to do something
about it?  And what is the point in complaining about the crowd's
booing?  He said that the crowd wasn't positive enough.  Well, it's
Rick's job to give them a reason to be positive.

Bill Cooper
wfcooper@tiac.net