Officials

[D Parker <danp@town.ipswich.ma.us>]

Heh.  If you thought the officials from last night were bad, believe it or
not they got worse.

What's worse than watching Reggie Miller flop all over the court?

Watching Alonzo "Bull in a China Shop" Mourning run through anyone in his
way and have the foul called on his defender.

A tip of the hat to the Celtics though -- the Heat made a run at the
beginning of the third quarter and looked like they were going to put away
the game, but the Celtics fought back and nearly came away with the win.

If you didn't see it, the C's were down by two with seconds to go.  Paul
Pierce missed a 20 foot jumper, the rebound came to the C's (Griffin?) and
he kicked it out to Antoine.  'Toine had an uncontested 18 footer, but
took two steps back to the three point line and went for the win.  He
missed.  Gutsy shot if he makes it, stupid if he misses.  Sorry 'Toine --
you got the goat horns tonight.

Fortson watch:  He played a lot in the first half and didn't contribute
much statisticly but really helped contain Mourning on defense.  I don't
think he played at all in the second half, which was very disappointing.

I didn't think Rick did a very good job at the start of the third quarter
when the Heat went on a 16-2 run.  Seems like he should have snuck in at
least one more timeout to try and stop the bleeding.  The Celtics just
went dead on offense and the Rickster pretty much hung them out to dry.

Again, it's a miracle the C's were in it at all, given the extra help the
Heat had with the officials.  Mourning just banged the crap out of his
defender repeatedly with no calls.  Potapenko, while guarding Mourning in
the post, went around him cleanly and tipped away an entry pass and was
called for a foul.  The Celtics had two three seconds calls on them and
the Heat had none, despite Mourning's typical setting up of camp in the
lane.  What was even more strange about that was that Mourning was
typically gaining a huge advantage by being in the paint as long as he
wanted, while one of the calls against the C's was Griffin in the paint
about twelve feet from the basket, out of the play.  I mean, the C's were
even gaining an advantage when they were in the lane more than three
seconds, yet they still got called for it!

I hope Pitino can keep spirits up.  They really deserved to win both of
these past two games.

Dan