Meg and I went down. What a great night it was!
Very pleasant to be in Boston. Nice, traditional Boston dinner at Durgin Park. A couple beers at an Irish pub called Hennessey's while we watched the middle part of the Red Sox game. Then the atmosphere around and at the Garden was electric. Converse gave us some green shirts ("Weapresent Boston") outside. Reebok gave little signs saying, "You Got Rondo'd." Our seats were draped with white shirts ("Gotta Beat LA" in green) courtesy of Modell's.
Then the game was a terrific see-saw battle. I thought the Celtics were outplaying the Lakers early in every phase except field goal percentage. Kevin Garnett should be able to torture any Laker who tries to defend him. Rondo the same. Whichever wing man Kobe doesn't cover should also be able to shoot essentially unmolested.
Pierce going down was scary. Then they were getting tough without him, and his return was inspirational.
It was great!
Now I get a sick feeling worrying about Pierce (and Perkins) recovering to be effective the rest of the series.
Here's Bill Simmons's column, which expands on my take.
Pierce's return creates echoes of Willis Reed's legendary limp out of the tunnel against the Lakers, but those with short memories have not yet made the full comparison. Reed went down in the first quarter of the fifth game and was out for the rest of that game and the sixth. The Knicks pulled out the fifth game without him; the Lakers won the sixth. In a nightmarish best-of-the-worst scenario paralleling that, the Celtics win game two in a terrific team effort, spawning reams of analysis and hours of sportstalk blather about team basketball -- what would today's Bill Simmonses have made of that Knicks team? They were a team of "aberration guys," you didn't know who would rise up and carry the team on any given night -- then they lose game three, maybe even four in LA without Pierce, but he makes it back for game five because it's LA and he's Paul Pierce. Then, unlike Willis Reed, Pierce plays almost the whole game and carries the Celtics to a victory in his hometown, cutting out the Lakers' hearts and stomping on them. The return to Boston for game six becomes a forgone conclusion when the Celtics smothering defense causes the Lakers to set a record low for first quarter scoring in the finals, Kobe won't pass to anyone because every Euro on the squad has gone catatonic and Lamar Odom has imploded. Fish brings the ball up, passes to Kobe on the wing, who dribbles twice before hoisting an off-balance three again and again and again.
Well! That's just getting carried away into fantasyland.
But as shell-shocked as those Euros looked and played, I think the Celtics can steal a game without Pierce if they have to.
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