POST GAME LAL - HOME - LAL 129, BOS 128 Final

Celtics Wrap: Rajon Rondo’s Buzzer Beater Stuns Boston, Gives Lakers 129-128 Win[/b]

NESN by Joshua Schrock on Thu, Feb 7, 2019 at 10:39PM

BOSTON — Through a quarter-and-a-half at TD Garden on Thursday night, LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers looked completely lifeless.

Two nights after getting whacked by 42 points in a loss to the Indiana Pacers, the Lakers trailed the Boston Celtics by 18 points and were well on their way to a second straight blowout loss.

But James and the young Lakers rallied, scoring 42 points in the third quarter to take a lead into the final stanza.

The Celtics retook the lead early in the fourth and led by two with 37 seconds remaining when Kyle Kuzma drilled a 3-pointer to give LA a one-point lead with 18.5 seconds remaining. Kyrie Irving came down and banked in a layup to give the Celtics back the lead, but Rajon Rondo grabbed a loose ball and hit a mid-range jumper as time expired to give the Lakers a 129-128 win.

With the loss, the Celtics fall to 35-20, while the Lakers improve to 28-27.

Here’s how it all went down:

STARTING FIVE
PG: Kyrie Irving
SG: Marcus Smart
SF: Jayson Tatum
PF: Marcus Morris Sr.
C: Al Horford

SLOPPY FIRST
Both teams struggled to find a rhythm the outset with the Celtics holding a slim 11-9 advantage after the opening six minutes of play.

The Celtics found a bit of a groove in the second half of the frame, while the Lakers continued to struggle from the field. Boston took a 30-24 lead into the second quarter thanks to six points from Irving and Smart, respectively.

LA shot just 37.5 percent from the field in the frame, but Lance Stephenson poured in nine points off the bench to keep them within arm’s reach.

C’S OPEN IT UP, LAKERS FIGHT BACK
Boston’s bench thoroughly outplayed the Lakers’ second unit to open the second quarter, outscoring LA 18-11 in the first four minutes of the frame. The Lakers were forced to take a timeout after Jaylen Brown threw down a thunderous breakaway dunk to push the lead to 13.

Boston continued to pummel the Lakers in the second quarter, growing its lead to 18 and causing LA to take another timeout with six minutes remaining.

James and the Lakers didn’t quit, though, as LA closed the frame on a 16-7 run over the final 4:05 to cut the lead to 66-57 at the break.

James and Stephenson led all scorers with 14 apiece, while Tatum, Brown and Terry Rozier each scored 11.

LAKERS HEAT UP
LA opened the second half with more focus and intensity than they showed in the first, ripping off a 10-4 run over the first 3:56 to cut Boston’s lead to 70-67.

After struggling from downtown in the first half, the Lakers went 9-for-13 from the 3-point line in the period, en route to a 42-point (!) quarter that gave them a 99-93 lead after three.

Kyle Kuzma led all scorers with 20 after three, while Tatum paced Boston with 18.

HEADER
The Celtics found their legs quickly to begin the final frame.

With James, Kuzma and Ingram on the bench, Boston’s second unit opened the stanza on a 9-2 run to take a one-point lead with 10:10 to play.

The C’s lead sat at 112-110 with 4:44, when James and Irving started to duel. First, Irving beat Kuzma off the dribble and finished at the rim. James came back down and drilled a triple but Irving answered with a 3-pointer of his own to push the lead to four. After James clanked one from deep, Irving came down and drew a foul on his ex-mate, sinking two free throws to grow the lead to six.

Boston led by six with 1:24 to play and appeared to have the game in hand, but Kentavious Caldwell-Pope and James drilled back-to-back 3-pointers to tie the game at 124 with 34.8 seconds remaining.

After two Tatum free throws gave the Celtics the lead, Ingram found Kuzma for a wide-open 3-pointer that the forward buried to give LA a one-point lead with 18.5 seconds left.

Irving received the ball and blew past Ingram and Kuzma, banking in a layup to give Boston the lead with 11 seconds left. Ingram came down and missed a layup, but Rondo grabbed the rebound and drilled a jumper at the horn to give LA the win.

PLAY OF THE GAME
*insert fire emoji here*

NEXT UP
The Celtics hit the hardwood again Saturday night when they host the Los Angeles Clippers. Tip-off from TD Garden is set for 8 p.m. ET.

112288

We wasted great games by Tatum, Rozier, Brown, and Theis. Someone needs to ask questions about defense. I know the rules are different but we either give up layups or open 3 pointers. If the Lakers weren't so bad from the line it wouldn't have come down to the last shot anyway.

Never Forget

Don't feel too bad that we lost by one kiddies.   We should have lost by more and not even been ahead in the final seconds ... LAL shot 7/18 from the FF line.

We lost this game in the 3rd quarter when we went back to playing long ball and forgot that they were allowed to score in the paint.  That was our opportunity to put them down big time but we failed, a theme that has been reoccurring throughout the season.

Hey what stellar defense allowing them to score 129 points let alone the great defense guarding the 3 pt arc.

Will be interesting to see who we get from the garbage heap in the next few weeks to fill a roster spot.

112288

Watching the post game show and the good news is Tommy will back alongside Mike Gorman for the next game!

Pelicans have no one to blame except themselves, letting go of Rondo was a big mistake, had 7 years to put a team around AD and failed miserably. Big game Rondo showed up as did James. I liked the way our young guys came to play, 2 J’s, Rozier, Theis all played very well, Theis was Johnny on the spot, coming up with a lot of big plays.
Unfortunately we collapsed soon after playing great building up an 18 point lead, I don’t know what happened to our defense, but Lakers set a franchise record with 22 3’s, and put up a 42 point 3rd quarter. Is it me or does GH look overmatched against elite teams or elite players both ends? James blew by him easily too many times, had a nice dunk, otherwise looked lost on offense. Morris has slowed down again, looking like a snail with ball right in front of him couldn’t grab it...??? Kyrie is not gonna be Superman every night, almost pulled it off without his A game.

can't lose against these types of teams and really be contenders.

that is all

Vs. OKC and LA we played really poor D. Piss poor. Glimmer -Theis.

Despite losing, I really liked watching Rajon play - always one of my favorites. How NOLA let him go boggles my mind.

worcester wrote:Vs. OKC and LA we played really poor D. Piss poor. Glimmer -Theis.

Despite losing, I really liked watching Rajon play - always one of my favorites. How NOLA let him go boggles my mind.

Right if they had him, they would be in playoffs right now and his shooting has finally improved. I too was rooting for us and rooting for Rondo....

I’m wondering if we gave Timelord some of Morris minutes, letting him play with Al and Theis, if that would have improved our defense last night?

If you don't respect the game, the game will not respect you.  The Laker young'uns were the ones being dangled like bait for 2 weeks and played like they had something to prove, or maybe it they were playing extra hard for Rondo but either way they were getting most of the 50/50 balls.

I agree with 112288.  If it wasn't for their horrendous frito shooting we would have lost by double-digits.  That's the really depressing part.  The truth is we blew an 18 point lead, giving up 42 points in a quarter, to a team with the #14 offense.  Admittedly, those numbers were diluted when LeBron was out but still, not very impressive.

We gave up 50 points in the paint.  We average a 5th 45ppg in the paint, normally.  This is against a team that was short-handed because they just traded one of their centers, Zubac, to the Clippers and the replacement, Mike Muscala, wasn't in uniform.  

129 points we gave up.  We average 106.  That means we gave up 23 more points than we have all season on average.  Awful.

Some of their 3pt fgm were ridiculous shots.  LeBron from 28'.  KCP with a hand in his face.  But some were just poor closeouts.

I'm thinking we have a Kyrie problem, and it's not Kyrie's fault.  I think Rozier was right on when he said that sometimes "they just stand around and watch Kyrie do his thing".  He went on to say "you would too".  Yeah, and that's why we're not professional basketball players.   You're supposed to keep your head in the game and not become a spectatator, that's our job and privilege.  When we move, he hits them, but they don't move.  We fell apart because we were standing around watching Kyrie and he was missing.

Who sucked?  

1.  Kyrie.  He scored 24 points, but 10 of those were from the line.  That's good, we need more trips to the line, but his 6-21 killed us ESPECIALLY since we stood around and watched him miss.

2.  Morris.  Practically a no-show.

3.  Smart.  Had some good defensive possessions, he always does, but 2-10 from the field, 2-9 from 3.  This was the old, bad Marcus Smart.  We haven't seen him much this year but he showed up last night.

Al Horford had a mediocre game.  Not bad, not good.  His block of Ingram at the rim almost saved the game, but for the lucky bounce to Rondo.  Or was it a lucky bounce?  Rondo was moving and the ball came to him, our players weren't.

Hayward with a mediocre game too.  He only scored 4 points on 2-5, so not a lot of fgas, but he had 6 rebounds and 5 assists.  So, he did some things well, he just didn't score.  But we scored 128 points on 49% shooting, so overall our scoring was fine.  It was our defense that sucked and I don't know how much of that was due to Hayward.  I think it was an overall breakdown.

Who stepped up?

1.  Tatum.  I'm not sure I'm down with the whole AD thing anymore, because of his opposition to re-signing with us, but if it's going to happen I hope NOP management watched this game.  They're going to want him even more now.

2.  Rozier.  Maybe NOP likes him more now?  They seem loaded with guards but, you know, trade'em.  Very good game by TRo.

3.  Game Ball to Theis.  I'm not sure how much more we could ask for from him.  He was everywhere.  If one Celtic played defense, it was him.

4.  Brown.  18 points on 7-10, 2-4 from 3.  You can have Tatum OR Brown, NOP, you cannot have both and now that Brown's hand seems to be healed I'm not sure which is more valuable.

This was embarrassing.  Not because it's the Lakers, I don't care about that, we play them 2x/season and if we're both in the Finals, but because we had an 18 point lead, at home, against a mediocre team that was short-handed due to trades and injuries (Ball is out).

I think Brad should tell players that it's ok for them to stand around and watch Kyrie.  They can do it all they want...from the bench, and if Brad sees them doing it while they're on the court that's where they're going.  And that goes for veterans like Morris too.  

The Celtics did not play with Pride last night, and I'm disgusted.


bob


.

Hayward looked tentative on offense bob, I give him credit he played within his limitations and didn’t shoot us out of the game....he can’t score, that’s the problem.

Well written BOB!

DITTO!

112288

cowens/oldschool wrote:Hayward looked tentative on offense bob, I give him credit he played within his limitations and didn’t shoot us out of the game....he can’t score, that’s the problem.

Cow,

He can score, we've all seen him do it, he just doesn't do it consistently and that's a problem.

Last night he only took 5fgas.  One could argue that's not enough for a scorer, and that's a valid point, BUT AS A TEAM we took 94 fgas, and that's A LOT!  Should he have taken some of Kyrie's fgas?  Sure, even if he continued to shoot 40% (he was 2-5) that's better than Kyrie's 29% and we only needed two more points, but I'd say the problem was Kyrie taking 21 fgas when he's struggling and not Hayward only taking 5.  When Kyie's on he's magic, and that's part of our problem as I opined, but either way we took 94 fgas.  We are averaging 90.6fgas/game, good for a tie at 4th, and we beat that number last night.  The problem was not that there weren't enough Celtic shooting.

The problem is that the Lakers shot almost 52% and almost 54% from 3.  That's not Hayward's fault for taking only 5 fgas anymore than it is Morris' fault for only taking 5 fgas too (if Hayward going 2-5 doesn't cut it then what about Morris' 1-5?  And Hayward got more rebounds and assists than Morris, so at least he did somethings right).  Our problem last night was defense, or lack thereof.  We had 6 players in double-digits.  That's quite good.  The Lakers had 7, and that's very bad.  


bob


.

Interesting that our young guys who need to learn how to play came to play and all of our veterans were sub-par to varying degrees.

It was an exciting game.  It really was but LA made a franchise record 22 3 pointers.  Yes we gave up too many PITP but those 22 3 pointers is what got them back in the game and kept them there.

They were significantly bigger at center while rotating McGee and Chandler.  Theis however played great and Boston did win the rebounding battle.  But What I saw was too many of our guys turning their heads as their opponent cut to the rim or guys not getting back to defend the fast break.

Rondo did a masterful job of picking us apart and James had a tremendous triple double.

I think that our coach has locked himself into a preset number of rotation minutes.  In the recent poll on hayward I mentioned that Brad needs to determine if he is fluid or not.  Last night he looked somewhere in between but was not really involved in the offense.  On the other hand LAL had no one to match up with Jaylen Brown who ended up playing 25 minutes while Hayward played 26.  I thought Brown played very well last night.  I thought that both him and Terry who also turned in an A game should have played more minutes with both Kyrie and Smart having well below average games.  You have to use the wind to move the sailboat.

Anyways this was one of the games I included when looking at the remaining schedule of quality opponents.  

LAC are up Saturday and they have pretty much dismantled their team so I expect a win.

What an entertaining game that was last night.
I am very surprised at the outcome after the tumultuous week the Lakers had.
For Rondo to have his first ever game winner in Boston was incredible.
As for Hayward, he looks nothing like the player he was in Utah.
He looks lumbering and slow compared to everyone else out there.
Fortunately Kyrie draws so much attention and kicks the ball out for open looks for his teammates.
If Gordon had to create his own offense, I no longer think he has the ability to do so.
This was a big win for the Lakers for a number of reasons.
Not a big loss for Boston.
They will probably still finish 3rd in the East.

We suck on defense when the other team knows it can score in the paint or at the rim. Last night, that was most of the time. When we collapse the D because we have no rim protector, the 3s start raining down. A real center, Williams, instead of Morris and Hayward would help, but I've lost faith that it will happen. I think Theis is our best 4 (and Al is 2nd). Great as KI is individually, I'd trade him in an instant, because everyone else plays better without him. I hope that Danny's marriage pledge, in another thread, is no more reliable than the IT-Celtics marriage of two years ago. Rondo still has it. Hawk

Dboss I totally agree by the third the ones that are on, that earned the minutes should GET the minutes especially in a tight game. Stevens has blown too many games by not playing the hot guy enough and sticking to pre set minutes. Last night Morris and Smart could have gotten 5 less minutes each with Jaylen and TR getting more.

Bob I agree we lost because of the defense, too many back cuts leading to Rondo picking us apart and bad transition defense.

Tom Westerholm @Tom_NBA
about 2 hours ago
According to the NBA’s L2M report, Tyson Chandler set an illegal screen on Kyrie Irving on the final possession last night that referees missed.

reply retweet like


bob


.

bobheckler wrote:If you don't respect the game, the game will not respect you.  The Laker young'uns were the ones being dangled like bait for 2 weeks and played like they had something to prove, or maybe it they were playing extra hard for Rondo but either way they were getting most of the 50/50 balls.

I agree with 112288.  If it wasn't for their horrendous frito shooting we would have lost by double-digits.  That's the really depressing part.  The truth is we blew an 18 point lead, giving up 42 points in a quarter, to a team with the #14 offense.  Admittedly, those numbers were diluted when LeBron was out but still, not very impressive.

We gave up 50 points in the paint.  We average a 5th 45ppg in the paint, normally.  This is against a team that was short-handed because they just traded one of their centers, Zubac, to the Clippers and the replacement, Mike Muscala, wasn't in uniform.  

129 points we gave up.  We average 106.  That means we gave up 23 more points than we have all season on average.  Awful.

Some of their 3pt fgm were ridiculous shots.  LeBron from 28'.  KCP with a hand in his face.  But some were just poor closeouts.

I'm thinking we have a Kyrie problem, and it's not Kyrie's fault.  I think Rozier was right on when he said that sometimes "they just stand around and watch Kyrie do his thing".  He went on to say "you would too".  Yeah, and that's why we're not professional basketball players.   You're supposed to keep your head in the game and not become a spectatator, that's our job and privilege.  When we move, he hits them, but they don't move.  We fell apart because we were standing around watching Kyrie and he was missing.

Who sucked?  

1.  Kyrie.  He scored 24 points, but 10 of those were from the line.  That's good, we need more trips to the line, but his 6-21 killed us ESPECIALLY since we stood around and watched him miss.

2.  Morris.  Practically a no-show.

3.  Smart.  Had some good defensive possessions, he always does, but 2-10 from the field, 2-9 from 3.  This was the old, bad Marcus Smart.  We haven't seen him much this year but he showed up last night.

Al Horford had a mediocre game.  Not bad, not good.  His block of Ingram at the rim almost saved the game, but for the lucky bounce to Rondo.  Or was it a lucky bounce?  Rondo was moving and the ball came to him, our players weren't.

Hayward with a mediocre game too.  He only scored 4 points on 2-5, so not a lot of fgas, but he had 6 rebounds and 5 assists.  So, he did some things well, he just didn't score.  But we scored 128 points on 49% shooting, so overall our scoring was fine.  It was our defense that sucked and I don't know how much of that was due to Hayward.  I think it was an overall breakdown.

Who stepped up?

1.  Tatum.  I'm not sure I'm down with the whole AD thing anymore, because of his opposition to re-signing with us, but if it's going to happen I hope NOP management watched this game.  They're going to want him even more now.

2.  Rozier.  Maybe NOP likes him more now?  They seem loaded with guards but, you know, trade'em.  Very good game by TRo.

3.  Game Ball to Theis.  I'm not sure how much more we could ask for from him.  He was everywhere.  If one Celtic played defense, it was him.

4.  Brown.  18 points on 7-10, 2-4 from 3.  You can have Tatum OR Brown, NOP, you cannot have both and now that Brown's hand seems to be healed I'm not sure which is more valuable.

This was embarrassing.  Not because it's the Lakers, I don't care about that, we play them 2x/season and if we're both in the Finals, but because we had an 18 point lead, at home, against a mediocre team that was short-handed due to trades and injuries (Ball is out).

I think Brad should tell players that it's ok for them to stand around and watch Kyrie.  They can do it all they want...from the bench, and if Brad sees them doing it while they're on the court that's where they're going.  And that goes for veterans like Morris too.  

The Celtics did not play with Pride last night, and I'm disgusted.


bob


.

I agree and I didn’t even watch it. Heard most of it on the radio and wanted to drive off a cliff in the second half. This team frustrates the hell out of me!

Poor D killed us. Poor coaching leading to improper players' minutes on the court contributed to our loss. Hawk was right about our insufficient rim presence causing us to collapse our D which opens up the 3. Brad has to step up his learning curve...quickly. Brad, play the hot hands.

In the starting 5 the weakest defender is Morris, who is stretch 4 that does not protect the rim and is not consistent board eater either. Basically if his shot is not falling, he’s usually not giving you alot in other areas. Theis has earned the starting 4 if I’m the coach, another longer faster defender at the 4, now with Tatum and Al, 3 potential shot blockers on frontline.

A frontline with Williams, Theis and Jaylen could also give us shotblocking and better defense on frontline. How come I can think of better defensive rotations and BS hasn’t even tried them yet and we’ve had defensive breakdowns?

Because past success has made Brad prideful...

I first raised this issue about Brad over a year ago. I am glad that others are seeing this now too.

Perhaps Brad has hit his ceiling as a coach..........time will tell.

I would mix it up and put Morris at the SF/3 position and bring Williams in at center and Horford at PF/4

Tatem could slide to SG/2 and Irving at PG.

112288