Re: Celtics Post-Game Thread (Collection of past threads)

[bobheckler]

the game's in Boston, Bob, but i bet you really knew that. C'mon, Home Court ! they already made their solitary trip to Denver for the year (and lost. i was there, and took no joy in the Nugs victory.)

Michael

Michael,

Actually, I spaced out and thought it was in Denver. I remembered we lost in Denver earlier but forgot we only do 1-and-1s with western conference teams.

Even better.

bob

/

[123456]

This was one of those games where the Cletics could do little on either end of the court. What started out like as a competive game (23-19 Boston after 1 and a mere one point deficiet at half time) turned into very ugly 3rd and 4th periods for the Celtics.

They could not put the ball in the hole (shooting .37% including a gruesome 1-14 from behind the arc) Whenever It seemed like Boston would get their game into gear there was Manu driving the lane again and agian for layups or stepping back form jumpers.

The ball just would not bounce the Celtics' way tonight. It seemed like every contested rebound or loose ball ended up in the hands of a Spur.

And as the game progressed nthe Celtics energy continued to weaken and their will to play good basketball was simply not there tonight.

There really is not much more you can say except I sure hope they get back oin track for OKC onw Wed.

This was not a trend juts a bad game against a pretty good team.

dboss2

[bobheckler]

It is well documented that the Celtics have trouble with young, athletic teams. It now appears we have trouble with short-handed geriatric ones as well. I should probably post this on the "glimmer" thread, but this game is proof that "even senior citizens can still beat good teams, so why not us too?"

1. No Ganas.

2. No Ganas.

3. No Ganas. Ok, I got that out of my system, but the taste is still in my mouth.

4. We shot 37%. NOBODY can win like that. We held them to 43.6% shooting. You should win if you do that.

5. Rondo was sloppy as all hell last night. 4 turnovers, pretty much all of them unnecessary and lazy. With 7 assists, that's an assist-to-turnover ratio of 1.75. That's mediocre backup point guard numbers, not starting point guard much less an all-star. Tony Parker completely outplayed him last night. What? Parker didn't play? Gee, I guess he got whupped by a bencher then. George Hill (who?) was a +13 running his team, Rondo was a -9. I'm sorry we weren't able to field a player that would make you want to show up and play up to your talents, Rajon. We'll try to find one for you next game, so that you won't embarrass yourself again.

6. Nobody could stop Ginobili. Nobody could stay in front of him. It was Matador defense all night. Ole! This was vintage Ginobili last night. When he's healthy, he's very, very tough. A plug here for Argentinean players. They can shoot like Euros, but they are tough hombres that play defense too. Most of the Argentines in the NBA can play on my team anytime. Ginobili flops a bit much for me, but he works hard on both ends.

7. The Celtic star of the game yesterday was rarely used sub Shelden Williams. He was 5-5 from the floor (proving conclusively that the rumors of there being a lid on the basket were untrue) and just generally threw his weight around. He committed 4 fouls in less than 12 minutes, but at least he did something right. That's more than can be said about just about anybody else on the squad.

8. The +/- of the starters are much worse than the +/- of the bench. In fact, the player with the best +/- on the Celtics last night (still coming in at a pathetic -5) is Rasheed Wallace, who is normally a sub.

9. One bright spot is that it looked like KG and Sheed held their own against Duncan and McDyess. An old Duncan and an ancient undersized-for-a-center McDyess.

10. We gave up 14 offensive boards. A lot of them were simply due to lack of effort and lack of focus. We stood around and waited for the ball to come to us while the Spurs avoided contact and moved their feet. We gave up.

What the hell does Doc say to them now? What does he say? "Where's your pride?" "Don't you want to win?" "Did you expect them to just roll over?" "This is called a ball, you're supposed to want it"?

The playoffs are almost here. We've been hearing for months about how the Celtics are bored and are saving themselves for the games that count, are injured and can't build and chemistry with their makeshift lineups, blah, blah, blah. What do they say to themselves when they look at themselves in the mirror today? What do they say?

bob


/

[sinus007]

Hi,
It is reported that Spurs hired a famous voo-doo master but she could sneak into TD Garden only at half-time, therefore could start working only in the 3rd quarter. You did see the result.
Also, last summer RR spent time with the wrong guy: he should've gone to Lebron to be taught how to stay competitive every game no matter what.
I'm sorry, but it's the best explanation I could come up with. WTF happening with the team?

AK

[jeb]

bobheck


The rebounding hurt us but I maintain it was scoring or lack therof that doomed us. I think bygpyg put forth the proposition (to go all morrison) that when our d is outta whack we lose our flow and the offense follows the defense off a cliff.


In games against good teams we always hit a brick/cinder block/ steel/ iron/ pig iron/ 2000 year old concrete scoring wall and the ball just will not go in at all in any way. See the second half of the last cleve game. See the second half of last nights game. Ive gotten to where I can almost see these things coming.

Step back for sure. Hated to see all those o boards for san antone and he Boston crowd which really knows hoop booed em for it.

It was only one game but there are trends which cant be ignored.

[bobheckler]

bobheck


The rebounding hurt us but I maintain it was scoring or lack therof that doomed us. I think bygpyg put forth the proposition (to go all morrison) that when our d is outta whack we lose our flow and the offense follows the defense off a cliff.


In games against good teams we always hit a brick/cinder block/ steel/ iron/ pig iron/ 2000 year old concrete scoring wall and the ball just will not go in at all in any way. See the second half of the last cleve game. See the second half of last nights game. Ive gotten to where I can almost see these things coming.

Step back for sure. Hated to see all those o boards for san antone and he Boston crowd which really knows hoop booed em for it.

It was only one game but there are trends which cant be ignored.

jeb,

I agree about the scoring. I specifically mentioned in my little diatribe about how we only shot 37% and you can't win like that. I also should have mentioned we only took 73 fga. Hard to win even if you're shooting 47% with only 73 fga.

Giving up offensive rebounds does two things: it gives the other guy another chance to score AND it takes an opportunity away from us (ergo, the 73 fga). If we had cut the offensive boards surrendered down to a more palatable 7 (still too many, but 7 offensive rebounds out of 41 total rebounds (they got 48, so subtract these 7) is swallowable), that's 7 more shots we get. Even with a miserable 37% fg% we'd still get 5 or 6 more points. Not enough to win the game, obviously, but we'd at least not be booing them.

These scoring droughts will kill us, if we don't fix them. Unfortunately, I think if they were fixable they'd already be fixed.

To come back to a recurring point of Sam's, we need more motion in our offense. Motion will create better shots which, presumably, will produce more buckets at a higher efficiency.

bob

/

[jeb]

bobheck

One thing good is it wont (I believe) stretch into more than one game in a row. I feel it IS that fixed (scoring) and the playoffs are 7 games with space between.

[Sam]

But one thing is pretty apparent to me. The Celtics need their entire crew of starters to be available and relatively uninjured in order to compete at high levels on a reasonably regular basis. On offense, Sheed's still trying to get used to the system played by the bench, and he's just not able to contribute a lot with the starting unit. As maligned as Perk is, at least he knows the offensive system and can contribute a lot of solid picks (most of them stationary) that will spring guys like Pierce and Rondo.

I noted, even without seeing the game, the huge numbers of jumpers and three-pointers the Celtics settled for. I don't believe that happens nearly as much if Perk's in the game.

On defense, the tandem of Sheed and KG is nowhere near the force the duo of Perk and KG is. Therefore, the Celtics had little-to-no shot at stiffening their defense upon demand to compensate for the scoring drought.

I'm not saying the Celtics would necessarily have won the game with Perk in there, but I'd wager they wouldn't have become nearly as dispirited nearly as quickly with greater potential for going to the hoop and greater potential to make defensive stops at critical junctures. I believe that a lot of what people interpret as lack of energy or lethargy emanates from the frustration of not having answers due to what I'd call chemistratus interruptus.

Having Sheed with the starters also throws the bench out of whack. Yes, I realize that Shelden hit some shots, but Sheed's the main orchestrator of the bench's defense (even when he's not moving all that well). I have to believe that his absence weakened the bench's defense to the point where Tony Allen, rather than Marquis Daniels, was the first wing off the bench.

When this team's all together and healthy, they seem to have gotten to the point where they can play with everyone. But they're quite obviously not comfortable enough to adapt semi-instinctively to major changes in the lineup/rotation...at least not comfortable enough to compete at a very high level.

Jeb, the Celtics will benefit from the day off in the early rounds of the playoffs only in games two and four. The other days off will usually be travel days, meaning a walk-through practice or shootaround at the very most (and very likely not even those).

But what they will benefit from in each series is that, without a lot of formal practice time to prepare for the opponent, they'll get to know the other team early-on in a given series. And most opponents won't benefit as greatly as the Celtics because the Celtics (with a full complement of players) will have a greater variety of "looks" to present...IF Doc chooses to use that diversity.

Sam

[LACELTFAN]

Everytime I think that this team may be turning a corner, they turn the corner and go right into the ditch....I was pretty sure that a turnaround would happen later rather than sooner but it is getting to be about that time....Go C's....

[cowens/oldschool]

Sam
Great post,I too thought Perks absence really hurt the team,even his ponderous postups and finishes off feeds from KG and Rondo,Sheed while more skilled does not do this.....didn't see one dunk or finish off one of those type of feeds to Sheed.Also defensively Sheed can defend fairly well,but Perk just defends better even though stats might not always show it.Having Perk not in there threw Rondo off his game enough where the offense wasn't synchcronized right,players were just out of step the whole game,obviously especially the second half.
cow

[steve3344]

We get thoroughly dominated by the Spurs last night yet the mighty Nets beat 'em tonight to get their 10th win and avoid the worst record of all-time.

Go figure.

[gyso]

We get thoroughly dominated by the Spurs last night yet the mighty Nets beat 'em tonight to get their 10th win and avoid the worst record of all-time.

Go figure.

Steve,

The NBA is funny that way. The posters over at Admiral's Spurs Forum (Convivial Discussions on all things Spurious) have gone from the pinnacle to the pits in 24 hours and are quite besides themselves.

So, the Nets are not the worst team of all time. Good, now I don't feel so bad 'caus we lost to them last month.

gyso

[LACELTFAN]

At home, I might add...we lost to the Nets at home. If we had lost to them on the road, I'd be worried.

[bigpygme]

bobheck


The rebounding hurt us but I maintain it was scoring or lack therof that doomed us. I think bygpyg put forth the proposition (to go all morrison) that when our d is outta whack we lose our flow and the offense follows the defense off a cliff.


In games against good teams we always hit a brick/cinder block/ steel/ iron/ pig iron/ 2000 year old concrete scoring wall and the ball just will not go in at all in any way. See the second half of the last cleve game. See the second half of last nights game. Ive gotten to where I can almost see these things coming.

Step back for sure. Hated to see all those o boards for san antone and he Boston crowd which really knows hoop booed em for it.

It was only one game but there are trends which cant be ignored.

yeah, that was what i proposed - repeated defensive failures take the pop out of our offense. seems to me (and has seemd to others on various threads) that our offense often flows from our defense. i'm a little surprised that some of our resident gurus haven't backed that notion up (though Sam sort of did, by pointing out Perk's contributions on D were missing, and that without him the defense didn't/couldn't stiffen up when necessary). instead there's focus on offensive chemistry and lack of ball movement. and they're worthy points, but our hustle on defense often sets our tone generally, and sets our offense up.

Ginobili ate us alive (and has been doing that to other teams too, since moving to the starting line-up), and we had no answer except that "matador" effort (if it WAS an effort.) no stops, no fast breaks, no easy buckets, lousy fga's total, it all hangs together.

Will Perk be back Wed?

Michael

[jeb]

bygpyg

it makes sense to me these things you say...like they expect to stop people and get disjointed and off balance when they dont.

If Ray is getting good looks (whether he makes them or not) then the ball is swinging around good. He got no good looks agin the spurs and the ones he did he tried to drive.

The Spurs deserve credit for playing epic defense too.

[sdceltfan]

Analyzing this game is very easy: lack of energy in 2nd half, no frontline support on Ginobli, no one getting in front of Ginobli, and finally just plain quitting. Very little Celtic pride in evidence. The Spurs outhustled, outplayed, and outprofessionaled the Celtics. Just when I thought the Celtics had put this amateurish play behind them.

This is why I have been so disappointed in this team. There are games when the energy and Celtic pride is nowhere to be seen. I see no embarrassment or shame when it happens. How can one be proud of this team when they play with such lack of entuisiasm and pride at times?

They are wearing Celtic shirts, but don't deserve to shine Dave Cowen's shoes. How many times did a Cowens team lose by 20 in a season with less talent? I must be "old school", but feel this team doesn't work hard enough often enough to deserve a title.

Rivers is pleading and lecturing in huddles like he is talking to a bunch of rookies. He feels they need it. That is the shame of it all.

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