Bulpett:Jekyll and Hyde

[opi@unesco.org]

Jekyll and Hyde act won't cut it
by Steve Bulpett

Monday, November 15, 1999


Will they embrace the principles of the game that have earned them four
wins, or will they leave better judgment in the dressing room? As one
opponent's scout put it: ``Looking at the tapes and being there, it
seems they have it figured out one night. Then they come back and you
wonder why they're not even the sum of their parts.''

The weekend split offered a microcosm, with a slug-it-out win on Friday
against the hearty Knicks and a Saturday loss in Chicago that defied
explanation. At 4-3, the door still is open to an extremely  successful
season. But will the Celtics walk on through?

 The stretch run for the playoffs may be miles away, but at this point
they are having trouble recognizing the need to take care of business on
those occasions when the schedule presents an opportunity for relief.

Paul Pierce was quoted in the late editions of yesterday's Herald as
saying: ``One thing that I feel is like we're playing to the level of
our competition. And we can't do that if we want to be a playoff team.
We play Detroit - they come in our house 0-4 and we play down to their
level. We play Chicago, 0-5, and we play down to their level. And that's
something we can't do.''

  The Pistons have interior troubles even worse than the Celts without
Danny Fortson, yet they outplayed the C's badly in the paint on
Wednesday. They were a team on the ropes - hungry, to be sure, but  on
the ropes - and the Celtics allowed them room to breathe.

The Bulls? They're just awful. Chicago is in the fight for the top spot
in the lottery, and Saturday they were even without leading scorer Toni
Kukoc (back spasms). So the Celts raced off to a 14-point lead a little
more than seven minutes after tipoff. Then they throttled back on their
defense and accepted a 92-91 slap in the kisser.

 On Friday, the Celtics were throwing a blanket over Latrell Sprewell
and Allan Houston in crunch time. On Saturday, Fred Hoiberg was eating
their lunch.

``We let two games this week get by on us,'' said Antoine Walker. ``And
you can't have that when you're trying to fight for the playoffs -
especially when you're in a tough division like we are.''

While the Celts offense looked ragged after the first quarter Saturday,
Walker and his mates are aware the problem was born at  the other end of
the court with poor defense. While intensity and execution of rotations
on that side are less visible to most, a quality game there has to be a
staple of what the Celtics hope to become.

``Without question,'' said Walker. ``When you look at the Miamis and New
Yorks of this league, that's what they do well. They defend  every
night. It might not be there on offense all the time, but they   defend
every night and give themselves an opportunity to win.''


Celtics notes

Pervis Ellison picked up his third straight DNP Saturday. And after
giving the Celts an impressive 10 minutes in his first game with the
club Wednesday (Anderson was hurt most of the night), Doug Overton sat
for his second game in a row.

Neither is injured. According to C's coach Rick Pitino, it's a matter of
paring down his rotation to a working number.

In the four Celtics wins, Walker has shot 53 percent from the floor
(31-for-58) and averaged 7.5 rebounds. In the three losses, he is
shooting 38 percent (23-for-60) and pulling in 5.6 boards.

``Every game's going to be different,'' Walker said. ``Sometimes the
shots don't fall. Sometimes they're going to block you out and keep  you
off the glass. I don't worry about my game. I worry about whether we win
or lose, and we didn't win (Saturday) and that hurts.''