Celtics get past Hump Day

http://www.nba.com/celtics/news/sidebar/doc-finally-allows-celtics-run-wild



Doc Finally Allows Celtics to Run Wild


By Marc D'Amico








Celtics.com
October 4, 2012



ISTANBUL, Turkey – Doc Rivers used the first five days of training camp
to install his system and teach his newest players the Celtic Way. On
the sixth day of camp, he let those players run wild.



Thursday’s sixth practice of the preseason was the first that featured
extended scrimmage time. And by extended, we mean approximately
two-thirds of the entire practice.



The session began with minor installation and drills but the team
quickly got into scrimmaging that was broken up into four separate
games. Each game was timed and often scripted to follow specific
circumstances, but the players were given their first opportunity of the
season to play at full speed for a lengthy amount of time.




Kevin Garnett and his teammates finally got an opportunity to scrimmage on Thursday.

Brian Babineau/NBAE/Getty Images





“Our first time really scrimmaging extensively,” said Paul Pierce, “so I
had a chance to get up and down, working a few more plays in than we
had the past couple of days.”



While Pierce and his teammates were running up and down the court, their
head coach, Doc Rivers, was taking a laissez faire approach on the
sideline. He stood back, watched, and enjoyed the sight of the green
team, made up of the top eight players, and the white team, made up of
the rest of the roster, competing at a high level.



“I was very uninvolved in practice in a lot of ways,” said Rivers. “I just walked around and watched.”



While he was watching, he was taking mental notes of what played out
before his eyes. All four games were highly competitive and the series
wound up being a split at two games apiece. There were positives,
negatives, and everything in between, but that’s exactly what Rivers
expected.



“I don’t think anyone stood out or anyone was bad,” he said. “I thought
it was good at times, sloppy at times, but I think that’s the way your
scrimmages should look.”



It was perfect timing for the coaching staff to let the players run
wild. At some point, installation begins to reach a level of
information overload. That’s when Rivers knows that scrimmage time is
of the essence.



“I just wanted them to get up and down the floor, because the first
three or four days when you practice, you put in so much stuff they
don’t play enough,” Rivers said. “So I just wanted them to play
basketball.”



Being able to play basketball, rather than processing more and more of
the playbook, was exactly what the players needed. Kevin Garnett, who
is in his 18th NBA training camp, knows when the team reaches this
point, and he even has a nickname for it.



“We call today Hump Day,” said Garnett. “You do four or five days in a row, and it’s kind of tough, but today was a good day.”



Garnett, who is as competitive as they come, had to love what he saw.
His teammates, which were the regular starters plus Jeff Green, Jason
Terry and Darko Milicic, played well. Likewise, the third unit,
performed at a high level and was able to win half of the games in the
series.



That type of competition is exactly what the Celtics want and need
throughout the season. We all know how much this team prides itself on
practice, and the more competitive those practices are, the better the
team will become.



“When you have a third team that can come out there and push the first
unit and the second unit, it’s only going to make your team better,”
said Paul Pierce. “Usually your third team is the team that’s always
getting blown out, losing every game, but that’s not going to be the
case here.”



Not if Thursday was any indication. The third team hung with the first
and second team throughout the day of scrimmaging, and that’s expected
to continue for the remainder of the season. We don’t have the rest of
the season’s results yet, but in the meantime, let’s take a quick look
at today’s four-game series:


Game 1 – 6 minutes



Dionte Christmas banged in a 3-pointer from the top of the key – off the
glass, no less – to help the third unit win the first game by a score
of 14-11. The first-second unit hybrid team had a chance to tie the
game on the final possession, but Pierce and Rajon Rondo each missed
3-pointers.


Game 2 – 6 minutes



The first-second unit must have been motivated from that loss in Game 1,
because it came back strong in Game 2. Boston’s top players won the
second contest by a score of 12-8, and Milicic shined toward the end of
the matchup by successfully defending guard Dionte Christmas on the
perimeter, then blocking his shot attempt, to seal the win.


Game 3 – 1 minute



Rivers created a situational contest by putting one minute on the clock
and giving the third unit an 86-83 lead. Garnett began the game by
making just one of four free throws (he actually should have shot 0-of-4
from the line, but he capitalized on a lane violation by Fab Melo) to
bring the score to 86-84. After that performance, Rivers joked to
Garnett that, “They’ll be coming out with hack-a-Garnett pretty soon.”



Jamar Smith made a free throw for the third unit to make it 87-84, and
then Rondo was put on the line with just a few seconds left in the game.
He made the first shot, then attempted to miss the second, but the
shot accidentally fell through the net to make it 87-86. Rondo nearly
stole the inbounds pass to Kris Joseph, but Joseph corralled the pass
and kicked it ahead to Christmas, who dribbled out the clock to give the
third unit a 2-1 series advantage.


Game 4 – 4 minutes



Rivers put four minutes on the clock and instructed his players that
they would be drawing up the plays during timeouts. Jason Terry drew up
the first play for the first-second unit, which led to a wide-open
jumper for Garnett. Terry would score on his unit’s next possession to
make it 4-0, and then Rob Kurz scored on a driving layup for the third
unit to make it 4-2.



Then the highlight came.



Rondo drew up a play during a timeout and it worked to perfection. Jeff
Green ducked to the basket and caught a perfect pass from a teammate
and slammed home a reverse dunk that got some teammates fired up.
Pierce tacked on a free throw to make it a 7-2 game, and that was the
final score.







bob






.

Is it my imagination, poor memory, or what? But it seems we are getting much better coverage of preseason this year. I like it, I like it. thanx to all esp Bob for finding these articles and posting them here.
mulcogi

Bob,

I may be crazy (my wife would subscribe to that), but one of the highlights of the preseason for me has involved the written media coverage. At first I thought it was primarily Jackie MacMullan who was delving deeply into the human interest and psychological aspects of the game. But there has been a plethora of that stuff—almost to the point of overkill. (Of course, I'll never complain about a surplus.)

I've bitched in the past when the media seemed to be overjoyed each time they were gifted with what I call "easy news"—strikes, injuries, player squabbles, contract disputes, pretty much anything that relieves reporters from having to dig beneath the surface in their reporting. During this preseason, it's almost as though the reporters—having realized that none of the "easy news" stuff is going on—have been shocked into plying their trade the right way: by digging for the story behind the story and really getting into the heads of the athletes.

Even the reporting on each of these four mini-games—while it is obviously far too early to make much of it—stokes my internal furnace, excites my imagination, produces some very preliminary hypotheses to be tested over time, and makes me feel a closeness to the game and the team that I haven't experienced for years.

It takes me back to the pre-television NBA times (and before they broadcast preseason games on the radio) when fans in the preseason were so bereft of any little tidbit of NBA news that we'd try to draw implications if a player was spotted wiping his nose with his off-hand. At least, when one of those old reporters ran a piece on the team, he would usually present a lot of detail and color stuff. People like me would frame the article, hang it on the wall, keep rereading it, add some imagination, douse the flames of impatience for another day, and very likely keep it in a box for our grandchildren some day—not knowing that our mothers or wives would very likely discard it while we were at a game or something.

Most important, we succeeded in feeling really close to the team because we didn't need video; after all, we were all products of the radio age. Give us a few clues, and we'd take care of manufacturing implications.

Nowadays, we have video; and, if the sportswriters continue to dig for details and color the way they've been doing recently, we fans should have the best of all worlds.

Sam

I never can figure out how to copy CSNNE's videos, so here's the link to the page. Video segment of Scal and Gorman, quick flash video of the scuffle between KG and Xmas.


http://celticsgreen.blogspot.com/2012/10/celtics-odds-and-ends-from-today.html


bob


.

scal is gong to be a great addition to Celtics commentary, a few word whiskers, but thinking back to listening to the Cavs commentaters back in ohio once in a while, i think Scal's insight in 2 minutes was deeper than 20+ yrs of combined insight from the cavs commentary crew.

Hi,
Here is supposed to be RR's pass to JG.
Hope it works (the video)

AK

Mulcogi,

I guess you and I had the same thought. But, while I was typing mine, you posted yours. Great minds and all that stuff.

Take care,

Sam