Great victory

[Alex Wang <awang@mit.edu>]

You could see when they were up 20 and stopped passing the ball that
Charlotte was going to make a comeback. The Celtics were really just
trying to hang on in the end, and I got the feeling that if the game
had gone on another minute, they would have lost. But like Pitino said
in the postgame press conference, it doesn't matter whether you win by
15 or you win by 1.

Having Griffin is like having a second point guard on the floor on 
offense. He has the ability to almost always get to the hole under 
control and find the open man every time when the defense collapses.
And the way he makes steals is phenomenal; he goes for steals with
his hand under the ball like you're taught to, instead of slapping
at it like so many players do. 

Walker was doing pretty well at one point, when he was 7-13. After
that the offense stagnated and Walker got the idea to try to create
one on one, basically bowling into the lane and hoping for the refs
to bail him out. It was an ugly stretch of basketball for him but
one bad stretch against two full games of smart, solid play doesn't
make him some sort of basketball retard.

Battie finally played like the "Marcus Camby with a jump shot" that
we've been hoping for. 18 points on 8-13 shooting, 9 rebounds. It
seems like we have a different bench player who steps up offensively
each game for 18+ points. He beats his man up the floor so Anderson 
has to keep his eye out for him. 

The Celtics' offense really stagnated both because they stopped moving
and because their offensive threats couldn't create anything one-on-one.
It's amazing that the Celtics actually won with Pierce and Walker
having off days, and it's a testament to their depth. The same shots
that Pierce was hitting easily in the preseason and the first game
weren't going down for him. He fought his way to some putbacks of his
own missed shots and got a fast break dunk but had a terrible percentage
on jumpers. In the end, they depended on Anderson's ability to take
the basket to the hole. 

Honestly, though, on most nights you're going to be able to isolate 
Pierce or Walker and get decent production when the offense breaks down; 
it happens to every team.

The Celtics' constant pressure made the Hornets go with two point
guards down the stretch. They managed to render Eddie Jones pretty much
ineffective. In general though, Charlotte did a pretty good job getting
easy dunks and layups against the Celtics pressure in the second half.
The Celtics also benefitted from the rules changes because they would 
have had trouble stopping Mason if the new 5 second rule applied. There
was a sequence where Mason was just repeatedly slamming into Potapenko
while dribbling, and Vitaly pretty much stood his ground. Unfortunately 
Mason dished off to Campbell for a dunk. But I can't imagine that 
DeClercq could have stood up to this sort of abuse (which I really think 
should be an offensive foul).

The Celtics might have been suffering from a bit of fatigue themselves,
as Pitino noted after the game. The high pace of the first half and this 
being the third game in four days might have contributed to the letdown
in the last quarter and a half. 

The important thing is that we got a win against one of the elite teams
of the conference and we are now 3-0. Some of these sportswriters should
be eating their words soon. I wonder how this is going to affect their
"power rankings" =) Hopefully the Celtics can attack Indiana in the same
way that Charlotte did. 

Alex