C's Take 2 on Road: Boston 104- Dallas 99

[Bill Cooper <wfcooper@tiac.net>]

{ I posted this to Bentz list,  I thought I'd repeat it here.  Thanks
to Bentz for providing a stopgap)


This was a well played game, between 2 teams whose records
belie their current level of play.  The Celts probably should have won
the game by low double figures, but had a tough time executing the
offense in the last three minutes of the game.  Since we saw the Mavs
a few weeks ago the inexplicable Nelson had moved Nash into the
starting lineup, and moved Pack to the bench.

	The Mavs got off to a very fast start.  They got some easy
shots in taking a 5-0 lead.  Antoine Walker continued his recent
streak of strong outside shooting, and hit a three as the Celts tied
up the game at 7.  The 2 clubs traded baskets for much of the period.
Greg Buckner, the little used starter who basically starts the game so
Cedric Ceballos can come off the bench (Ceballos plays many more
minutes), was hitting everything he through up.  The offensive pace
slowed, and, one the last play of the quarter, Barros hit a jumper to
give the Celts the lead 25-24.

	Pitino was substituting extremely freely in this game, and
started the quarter with none of the starters on the floor.  The
reserves played well, and did most of the work on a 11-2 run which saw
the Celts extended out to a 37-30 lead.  Williams and Barros played
well.  The Celts pushed the lead up to double digits for the first
time at 44-34.  The Mavs rallied back, as Nelson went to a huge
lineup, (Bradley and Nowitzki) and the Mavs ended the half with a 13-5
run to close the gap to just 2 points (49-47).

	The Celts came out fast again to start the second half.  They
pushed the lead up to 14 at 63-49.  They looked to have taken control
of the game,  Pitino's substitutions became more frenzied late in the
half, as he took players out for 1 possession several times.  Once
again the Mavs closed towards the end of the period, this time to
within 8 at 80-72.

	The Mavs gave over most of the ball handling duties to Finley
at the start of the 4th.  Walker took advantage, stealing an errant
Finley pass, and going down the court for the Jam.  The Celts got the
lead up as high as 11 in the middle of the period.  Nelson went to
Bradley at center, and the refs helped out by letting the Mavs play a
zone (with Bradley in the paint).  The Celts offense really dried up
after the 5:30 mark of the period.  The Mavs limited the Celts to just
2 more baskets.  Pierce hit a big jumper with 19.3 seconds left to
put the Celts up by 5.  On the next play Finley hit a 3 to pull the
Mavs to within 2 with 9.0 to go.  Pierce hit a pair of free throws to
seal the win.  The final was 104-99.

	Even with the late dip the Celts hit at a .494 pace, while
limiting the Mavs to shooting .437.  The C's also had an advantage on
the offensive boards 14-11.  But the Mavs had a nice edge on turnovers
17-11, which gave them 6 more shots.

Lineups:
Celts: Anderson, Cheaney, Pierce, Walker, Potapenko
Mavs: Nash, Strickland, Finley, Buckner, Nowitzki

Players:
Walker: Yet another majestic effort.  29 points on 10-15 shooting, 4-7
on threes, 10 boards and 6 assists in 35 minutes.   If you think about
it, in the last 7 games, the Celts have only had a couple of real good
performances by the other starters.  The improvement has come from
Toine and the bench.  Even though, he's done a great job on the three
the last couple of games, I really feel like he's tempting fate
shooting it so much.

Williams: very nice game on offense with 18 points on 6-10 shooting in
28 minutes.  Most of his points came on slashes to the basket, rather
than taking jumpers as has been his recent habit.

Anderson: shot the ball poorly, unfortunately the rest of his game
matched.  He had 5 assists, but had 4 turnovers.  Somehow was having a
great deal of trouble getting around Nash (?).

Pierce: Made a couple of nice plays down the stretch.  the rest of the
night was very quiet, though, as he scored 15 points, and 2 steals in
30 minutes.

Potapenko: 5 offensive boards and 0 defensive in 22 minutes.  He also
scored 9 points.  Thought he should have been in the game at the end
instead of Battie to give the C's a nice target to hit went Bradley
went for blocks.

Barros: solid game with 11 points on 5-10 shooting in 21 minutes.

Battie: Another nice game with 8 points and 10 boards in 30 minutes.
Or are those good numbers for the #2 guy (tied with Pierce) in minutes
played?  Still, a big improvement over a month ago.

Fortson: there was too much height for Danny tonight.  He could get an
offense board, but couldn't do anything with it.  He had 0 points, 5
boards in 9 minutes (and 3 fouls, a couple of them dumb, even by his
standards.

Cheaney: Hit on 3-4 in just 13 minutes.

Griffin: much as I like Adrian, it would be hard to say much positive
about his play.

Coaching: The 5 guys who came off the bench played almost as many
minutes as the starters tonight.  Of course, if you consider Williams
and Battie as starters instead of Pots and Cheaney, the numbers are a
bit more normal.  Anyway, Pitino was subbing early, often and late. I
bet Toine came into the game 10 times.  And the game wasn't a run
away.

	If Nelson ever gets fired by the Mavs, as he so eminently
deserves, Rick should consider hiring him in some capacity.  As awful
as Don has been as a GM, he is still a brilliant tactician, and almost
pulled another rabbit out of his hat tonight.  He went with very large
lineups for big portions of the game, and got good mileage out of the
mismatches in produced.  I thought that Rick might counter by going
with Antoine at the point, but instead he tried to go small and defeat
the Mavs with the press.  In general it backfired, and that kept the
Mavs in the game long after they should have been gone.

the Celts are now 30-36.  They are just 1 game out of the 8th and
final playoff spot.  They are in Phoenix on Monday night.

Bill Cooper
wfcooper@tiac.net