Bring on the King

Everyone expected the Celtics to totally dominate the Hawks in the first round. And, they did when you really look at how the series played out. The average per-game point differential in this series was 12 in favor of the Celtics (game 1- 23, game 2-19, game 3- minus 9, game 4- minus 5, game 5- 25, game 6- -minus 3, game 7- 34). This was the second highest of any of the first round series (12.5- Lakers, 12- Celtics, 9.4- Hornets), which is particularly impressive when you remember that they lost three of those games. The Lakers had the highest average point discrepancy with 12.5, only slightly higher than the Celtics. However, they won every game in their series. If you only look at the four games that Boston won, the average margin of victory was 25.25 points. Total dominance. The truth is that the Hawks never stood a chance in this series. This begs the question of why we all had to suffer through several sleepless nights as we watched this series play out over 7 games. Furthermore, we have to wonder what the Celtics need to do differently as they advance to face more stiff competition. They took a big step towards answering those questions yesterday afternoon.

First, Doc did a much better job of managing the lineup yesterday. He's been completely erratic with his rotations throughout this series. John Hollinger really hammered it home for me yesterday when he pointed out that the Celtics had already used 12 players by the one-minute mark of the second quarter of game 6. There's two big problems there. One, you can't really establish a rhythm when guys are constantly coming in and out. Two, how can you possibly match up with anyone if you're keeping your best players off the floor? Maybe Doc entered the playoffs with the mentality of "if I keep these rotations constant, then my key guys will be more rested deep into the playoffs because they've played less minutes." In theory, that's fine. But, the best way to rest them is to not play every series to 7 games. Yesterday, Doc had the right mindset. It was a must-win, so he played the starters and the essential bench guys (Posey, Powe, Cassell). Not until the game was in hand did we suddenly see the bench emptied. Every game in the playoffs is a must-win. Hopefully, yesterday will be an indication of the gameplan for the rest of the post-season.

Second, A lot of the guys said it yesterday, this team had not played a meaningful game since they played the Hornets about halfway through March. They needed to be slapped around a little bit by this Hawks team before they could regain that intensity. Yesterday's performance was markedly more intense, particularly on the defensive end, than even the other three home games from this series. The Celtics will need to play with that same cut-throat mentality from yesterday if they want to de-throne King James.


Finally, LeBron James is better than Joe Johnson. Perhaps the biggest concern that Celtics fans had during the first round was "if we can't guard Joe Johnson, how are we going to deal with LeBron or Kobe?" That's a good question. I expect that we'll see Pierce on James when these teams tip off, and I also expect that we'll see Posey and (I hope) Tony Allen on him as the game progresses. One nice thing about being so deep is that we can roll out a lot of guys to take fouls and put James on the line, where he struggles. It's going to take a full team effort to stop LeBron, and I have no doubt that the Celtics are up to it. But, it's going to take that intensity that we saw from them in games 5 and 7. There were several times in that Hawks series, particularly in games 3 and 6, where it seemed like the Cs were coming in with the attitude of "alright, we've got these guys on the ropes. They should go down easy." As we head into this second round, that mentality can never enter their minds for a second. They need to always be on the attack, regardless of the situation. LeBron showed us all how dangerous he can be in last year's playoffs. Yesterday's game was a perfect example of how the Celtics need to play if they want to advance to the Conference Finals. It was reported that during a time out in the third quarter, despite a lead that was right around 30 points, Doc Rivers yelled at his team "DON'T LET UP!" They can't let up for a second in this next round. If they do, this 66-win team could end up being nothing more than the next page in King James' scrapbook.