If Cavs keep it close, mighty Celtics could collapse
Ryan W
ubiquitous_am_i at yahoo.com
Tue May 6 20:44:37 CDT 2008
Brian Windhorst is an idiot. He writes for a
Cleveland paper too, so I wouldn't put much stock into
what he says. I read an article of his yesterday that
had at least 2 factual errors.
>
>
> If Cavs keep it close, mighty Celtics could
> collapse
>
> By Brian Windhorst
> Special to ESPN.com
> BOSTON -- The _Cleveland Cavaliers_
> (http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/clubhouse?team=cle)
> don't want to see Gino.
>
>
>
>
> The popular facet of the reinvented _Boston Celtics_
>
> (http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/clubhouse?team=bos)
> mystique -- the one with a dance team and a
> dunking leprechaun mascot -- is the new version of
> the Red Auerbach victory cigar.
> It's a 1970s-era _"American Bandstand" clip_
> (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1MzP0rNN5w0) with a
> resplendent male dancer in bell bottoms, a glorious
>
> coiffure and beard, and a T-shirt that reads "Gino."
> When the game is in hand
> and the clip hits the videoboard, the faithful at
> the new Garden go as wild as
> the fans at Fenway during "Sweet Caroline."
> Most of the time this season, Gino has been called
> in by the middle of the
> fourth quarter, as the Celtics have made a habit of
> blowing out opponents at
> home. Try 14 wins of 20 or more points during the
> regular season and four wins
> by an average of 25 points over the _Atlanta Hawks_
> (http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/clubhouse?team=atl)
> in the first round.
> "They try and hit people early like a lot of
> heavyweight prize fighters who
> try to knock people out in the first round," said
> Cavs guard _Wally
> Szczerbiak_
>
(http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/players/profile?statsId=3329)
> , whose team
> begins its East semifinal series with the Celtics
> on Tuesday in Boston.
> The style of the Celtics is the antithesis of the
> style of the Cavs, who,
> purposely or not, have made fourth quarters must-see
> TV during most of the
> season. No other team in the NBA has had as many
> fourth-quarter comeback
> victories. Most of the time, it has been due to
> heroics from _LeBron James_
>
(http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/players/profile?statsId=3704)
> , who led the NBA not only
> in fourth-quarter scoring during the regular season
> but also in so-called
> clutch time, the final five minutes of a game when
> neither team is ahead by more
> than five points.
>
>
>
>
(http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/playoffs2008/columns/story?page=CavsCelticsPreview-080506&lpos=spotlight&lid=tab1pos1#)
>
> All that was before the Cavs watched the Celtics
> fail to put away the Hawks
> in any of the three close games in the opening
> series, even when it looked
> like Boston had safe leads late in the games. When
> a game was close, the Celtics
> couldn't close. They couldn't stop _Joe Johnson_
>
(http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/players/profile?statsId=3520)
> , their poise was questionable at best and
> some noticed their conditioning didn't appear to be
> sound after they spent
> much of the season on cruise control late in games.
>
> There's plenty of other strategy to deal with, but
> the Cavs know one thing as
> they try to unseat the East's No. 1 seed for a
> second straight season: The
> longer the game stays close, the better chance they
> have.
> "It is going to be vital for us to keep our poise
> and play through their
> runs," Cavs coach Mike Brown said. "That is a great
> team at home because they
> have self-motivators that feed off that crowd."
> This will be especially important in the first two
> games in Boston, when the
> confident Cavs might have their best shot against
> the still-shaky Celtics,
> following Boston's unexpected troubles against the
> Hawks.
> "We're going to approach it like we approach every
> series," James said.
> "We're going to try to get stops and execute on the
> offensive end. We want to
> compete and give ourselves a chance to win as many
> games as possible."
> By now, that simple formula has become gospel for
> James. Although the
> personnel around him has changed, the style and the
> substance of the team are the
> same, and he has reason to believe in it. This is
> James' eighth playoff series
> in just his third postseason, and he already has a
> pretty impressive 5-2
> record. Those five series wins, by the way, are more
> than either _Kevin Garnett_
>
(http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/players/profile?statsId=3007)
> , _Ray Allen_
>
(http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/players/profile?statsId=3080)
> or _Paul Pierce_
>
(http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/players/profile?statsId=3253)
> has, and Boston's
> big three have a combined 35 NBA seasons.
> When they made their unexpected playoff run in 2007,
> the Cavs allowed the
> fewest points per game in the postseason (86.7).
> This year, they picked up where
> they left off in the first round against the
> _Washington Wizards_
> (http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/clubhouse?team=was) ,
> a team known for its offense. The
> Cavs held the Wizards to 88 or fewer points in four
> of the six games and to 42
> percent shooting in the series. That effort kept
> them in almost every game,
> and in every game, they had the best player at the
> end.
> Until the 2007 Finals, when they let two home games
> slip through their
> fingers, the Cavs were 8-3 in playoff games decided
> by five or fewer points. Most
> of the time, James was the difference-maker.
> During this regular season, the Cavs beat the
> Celtics twice, both times by
> five or fewer points and both times with James
> making the plays down the
> stretch to deliver the wins. He averaged 35.5
> points in those wins. Until the
> streak was snapped in February in a loss in Boston,
> James had scored 30 or more
> points in nine straight games against the Celtics,
> a feat equaled only by Wilt
> Chamberlain.
> The Celtics play some of the most physical defense
> in the NBA, especially on
> the perimeter, where they apply pressure to the ball
> handlers. When the Cavs
> lost to the Celtics in February in Boston, they
> marveled at just how
> aggressively the Celtics played defense. A week
> later, _Tracy McGrady_
>
(http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/players/profile?statsId=3179)
> said the same thing when the
> Celtics shut him down and ended the _Houston
> Rockets_
> (http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/clubhouse?team=hou) '
> 22-game winning streak.
> That physical style doesn't work so well on James,
> who handles pressure well
> because of all his experience with double-teams. He
> has the ability to sense
> where the defenders are coming from, and at
> 6-foot-8, he often can see over
> them to find an open man. As he said, "If they
> double-team me, it won't be
> something I haven't seen before. It may have caught
> Joe [Johnson] off guard, but
> it won't catch me off guard."
> It does, however, affect the Cavs' point guards.
> _Daniel Gibson_
>
(http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/players/profile?statsId=4170)
> and _Delonte West_
>
(http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/players/profile?statsId=3841)
> both have trouble dealing
> with pressure, and in the past, each has been an
> inconsistent ball handler.
> The Cavs hemorrhaged turnovers at times against the
> Wizards, and turnovers
> lead to fast breaks and runs, which the Cavs can't
> afford against the Celtics.
> But West, Gibson, Szczerbiak and the now-healed
> _Sasha Pavlovic_
>
(http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/players/profile?statsId=3722)
> will have even more
> important roles against the Celtics, beyond dealing
> with the pressure, defensive and
> otherwise, that comes with playing a deep,
> talented, 66-win team. They will
> need to hit shots. The Cavs' defense is a constant,
> and so is their
> rebounding, but their shooting and offense have
> been spotty. When the players around
> James maintain their composure and hit shots, the
> Cavs suddenly have the look
>
=== message truncated ===
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