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["pgoggin@uh.healthbridge.org" <pgoggin@uh.healthbridge.org>]

This transmission may or may not have already been posted.  Sorry if this is a duplicate.

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	I drove down from Cincinnati and attended the game last night in Lexington, and whle I didn't take notes and am not prepared to give a play by play narrative, I'll give you my random thoughts.

-I ran into Clem Haskins at will call and mentioned to a lady standing next to me, "Hey, that's the Minnesota Gophers ex-coach."  She said to me, "why are they called the Gopher?"  I said, "I think it's a regional thing."  Then, she said, "oh, they must really like them gophers way out west."  (And I thought to myself, "west?")

-Quite surprisingly, there were almost as many Jazz fans and purple in the stands as vice versa and by far, the fan favorite was Utah's Scott Padgett.  It was also a much smaller crowd, and a crowd less enthusiastic towards Pitino, Walker and Walter then at the exhibition at Rupp 2 years ago. 

-With the abscence of Fortson, Pitino still had Walker at PF, Pierce at SF and Griffin at SG.  Adrian did nothing all night as far as I could tell.  He may have gotten a rebound, I guess.  Pitino refused to play Battie at PF alongside Vitaly at C.  Instead, with Battie at backup Center and matched up against Ostertag much of the night, he looked like the distratcted, overmatched, rail thin Battie of last year, when I was expecting the sturdy, shot-blocking presence at PF this year.  I cannot understand why Pitino refuses to play Anderson/Pierce/Walker/Battie/Vitaly--This would be by far his best lineup at the present and would put all three of Walker, Pierce, and Battie back at the positions we expect, creating the mismatches that we must rely on.  My only thought is that Pitino didn't want to upset the rhythm of the 2nd unit by taking away Battie, but why sacrifice the quality of the 1st team for the unity of the 2nd?  I can only hope that Pitino also sees this and will recti!
fy it by opening night.

-With that being said, Walker was guarded by chump change all night in Malone's absence (Torraye Braggs from Xavier and Pete Chilcutt from the Rick Fox UNC era) and he could have scored at will when facing up.  Instead he seemed disinterested and after a strong 1st quarter, disappeared.  He looked good facing up and could easily get to the hole against this patchwork opponent but, in the second half, abandonded the drive, went back to his spotty post game and mostly threw up off balance hooks or got blocked.  My assessment:  1. Could have scored 30 if he wanted to.  2.  Took the night off and scored around ten instead.  3.  Needs to get to the 3, fast.  4.  Needs to face up, not post.  (However, he may be a much more effective post player at the 3.)  Man I wish I was the coach.

-The only fountain of mediocrity in this desert of miserable play on the Celtics part was their point guards.  I like Kenny's offensive game a lot.  He looks fast, he is running, and when he got on the break, good things happened.  His shot looks good.  I really like him as our point.  Dana was en fuego in the first half with 17 points, hitting from all angles, almost every shot.  Both of them (along with the entire Celtics team, disappeared in the 2nd half).  Neither of them impressed me from the defensive end.  I know they can sometimes be physically overmatched but aside from that, they are simply undisciplined at one on one defense and I often saw them with their man between them and the basket.  I don't know how much basketball you all play, but when your man has the ball, this should not happen very often.

-Overall, the Celts played good offense in the first half, shot 59% from the field, got to the line, made their foul shots, and led at the half by 12.  Still, you kept saying to yourself, if we had played any defense at all, we would have been up by 20 at half.  I mean, really our interior defense is nonexistent.  Vitaly showed flashes of adequacy but you have to put him beside a defensive presence.  When your PF/C combinations are either Walker/Vitaly or McCarty/Battie you won't be able to defend down low, and you won't be able to rebound.  Those are the matchups Pitino chose to go with, and hence, we couldn't defend and we couldn't rebound.  As I've made this point twice, I should mention again, Pitino is smart, he knows this, and he will fix it by opening night, I'm sure of this.

-Whatever good that happenend for the Celts in the first half was a distant memory by the mid third quarter.  We came out.  We didn't defend.  We didn't rebound.  We didn't hustle.  We didn't pass.  Utah took the lead midway through the fourth.  Pitino looked like he still wanted to salvage a victory and put his starters in for the last 6 minutes but they were out of sync and instead of going to a sure matchup with Walker against the Sisters of the Poor, we chose to let Pierce and Kenny heave it.  Utah got an offensive rebound with about 10 seconds to go and Jacques Vaugn dribbled out the clock a la Cousy.  The Celtics and Pitino literally ran off the court in embarrassment.  

-Folks, I am the eternal optimist.  I thought the Dee Brown raise and the Pervis Ellison signings were good ideas.  I always give the Celtics the benefit of the doubt, but that's how bad they looked in the 2nd half.  I walked away thinking that we have a lot of talent but we were missing an anchor, someone to bolster the low post defense and someone to be an enforcer.  We played with no cohesion.  Still, if we can survive the 1st 6 weeks without Fortson (remember, I'm the optimist) and stay around .500, and if we can learn to play together, this can be a very good team.  I'm not going to get all crazy just because we laid an egg on the fourth game of a  ridiculous preseason road trip.  Sorry to have taken up so much of your time.

Goggin in Cincinnati

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