NBA Playoffs Blog – Page 108 – NBA Blog

Kobe scores 38 but Celtics beat Lakers in NBA Finals Game 5

The AP reports:

It’s looking a lot like 2008 again, with Paul Pierce carrying the Boston Celtics to victory in the NBA finals and leading them to the brink of yet another title.

Kobe scores 38 but Celtics beat Lakers in NBA Finals Game 5

Pierce scored 27 points—his best performance of this year’s finals—and the Celtics withstood 38 points from Kobe Bryant to beat the defending NBA champion Los Angeles Lakers 92-86 on Sunday night and take a 3-2 lead in the best-of-seven series…

Bryant outscored Pierce this time, but the Lakers’ guard got little help from his teammates. And the stretch where he was most dominant was also the time when the Celtics pulled away…

With the “Beat L.A!” chant reverberating at the Garden, Kevin Garnett scored 18 points with 10 rebounds and Rajon Rondo had 18 points, eight assists and five rebounds to help Boston become the first team in the series to win two games in a row…

Bryant did everything he could to send the Lakers home with the edge.

He scored 23 straight Lakers points between the 4:23 mark of the second quarter until there was 2:16 left in the third. But over that span, the Celtics expanded the lead from one point to 13…

Pau Gasol scored 12 points with 12 rebounds and Fisher, the Game 3 star, scored all nine of his points in the first quarter as no other Laker reached double figures in scoring until Gasol hit a free throw with 2:25 left. Andrew Bynum played on his sore right knee for 31 minutes, but he scored all six of his points and his only rebound in the first quarter.

Mike Bresnahan of the Los Angeles Times reports:

Bryant had 38 points but didn’t get much assistance. The Lakers had only 12 assists, the game basically turning into Bryant all by himself, for better or worse.

Ron Artest was poor on offense, yet again, scoring seven points on two-for-nine shooting and experiencing an equally bad defensive game as Pierce scored 27 points.

Andrew Bynum tried to play despite a sore right knee but had only six points and one rebound in almost 32 minutes.

Lamar Odom battled flu symptoms and again fell into single-single territory, totaling eight points and eight rebounds. He has yet to take 10 rebounds in a game this series.

The Lakers now trail in a series for the first time this postseason after scoring their fewest points of the playoffs.

Mike Bresnahan of the Los Angeles Times reports:

Bryant took some ill-advised shots, but how unsupportive was his cast? He was the only Lakers player in double-figure scoring until Gasol made a free throw with 2:25 to play.

The Lakers shot only 39.7% and were drilled in points in the paint, 46-32, but they had their chances in the fourth quarter, pulling within 87-82 on three free throws by Bryant with 1:30 left.

Then Derek Fisher somehow outleaped Kevin Garnett on a jump ball at the other end, and Bryant found Artest behind the Celtics’ defense, but Artest missed two free throws after being fouled with 43.3 seconds left.

Jonathan Abrams of the New York Times reports:

Beyond Bryant, the Lakers seemed unnerved, with their lowest point total this postseason. Gasol, Bryant’s usual running mate, tip-toed his way to 12 points on 12 shots. No other Laker scored in double digits. Derek Fisher, who received a technical with Ray Allen in the third quarter, and Artest each shot 2 for 9. Andrew Bynum, who had his troublesome knee drained between games, lasted 32 minutes, but did not score after the first quarter.

In between games with a long flight before them, Bryant said he would not offer a pep talk.

“What the hell is the big deal?” said Bryant, who made 13 of his 27 shots and four 3-pointers. “I don’t see it as a big deal. If I have to say something to them, then we don’t deserve to be champions.”

Lee Jenkins of Sports Illustrated reports:

The onus also falls on Artest, signed over the summer to guard players just like Pierce in situations just like this. Artest and Pierce have had many confrontations over the years, dating back to those classic Pacers-Celtics series in the early to mid 2000s; and at first, Pierce struggled terribly. Artest would push him out to the 3-point line, never allowing him to catch the ball where he wanted, forcing him to post up 20 feet from the basket. Even when Pierce did get the ball, Artest would often strip him as he started his dribble.

But according to a former Celtics assistant coach, Pierce gradually learned how to attack Artest. He became more aggressive getting to his spot. He held the ball more securely on the drive. And most important, he recognized that he was quicker than Artest and could get around him with a sudden first step. “You saw it start to change,” the coach said. Pierce was so effective against Artest on Sunday that at one point Bryant even asked to switch defensive assignments. The Lakers stuck with Artest, but for the first time in these Finals, he was soundly beaten.

Andrew Bynum ready for Game 5

Mike Monroe of the San Antonio Express-News reports:

Lakers starting center Andrew Bynum on Saturday pronounced himself “100 percent” for tonight’s NBA Finals Game 5 at TD Garden.

After playing only two minutes in the second half of Game 4, and just 12 minutes total, Bynum had an MRI on Friday on his sore right knee to be certain no additional physical damage had occurred, and then had fluid drained for the second time in the past two weeks.

Bynum is playing through the pain of a torn right meniscus cartilage and first had the knee drained June 1, two days before Game 1.

Davis, Robinson provide spark for Celtics in NBA Finals

Steve Buckley of the Boston Herald reports:

Glen “Big Baby” Davis and Nate “Little Baby” Robinson made for quite a tandem last night at the Garden.

The teamwork … the chemistry … the pacing.

The timing.

And that was just during the postgame press conference. During the actual game – that is, Game 4, NBA Finals, in which the Celtics [team stats] claimed a 96-89 victory over the Lakers – well, yeah, sure, Big Baby and Little Baby were pretty good there, too. Taking over the floor in the fourth period, Davis wound up with 18 points in 22 total minutes. Robinson scored 12 points, including a pair of treys. They rocked the joint.

Now it should be understood that Davis and Robinson never much knew each other before the late-season trade that liberated Robinson from the New York Knicks, the Celtics parting with the popular Eddie House, a hero of the ’08 championship run. Davis and Robinson were never college teammates, and never paired up in one of those glitzy, all-star high school tournaments. They never were cabin mates at the Five-Star, All-Around-the-World, You-Can-Be-a-Star Basketball Camp.

Yet when Robinson, ex-Knick, showed up in the room and the people in charge of these things stuck him next to Davis, it was box-office magic.

Glen Davis shines, Celtics beat Lakers in Finals Game 4

The AP reports:

Glen “Big Baby” Davis led the Celtics bench on a game-changing run Thursday night, scoring half of his 18 points in the fourth quarter as Boston pulled away from the Los Angeles Lakers to win 96-89 and knot the best-of-seven series at two games apiece.

“This is what legends are made of, this is where you grasp the moment,” Davis said. “Just play in the moment.” …

“We know what to do. We know how to play. We know how to get it done,” said Lakers forward Pau Gasol, who scored 21 points to go with a game-high 33 for Kobe Bryant. “And we know how important Game 5 will be, so we’ve just got to get ourselves mentally and physically ready … to accomplish our mission.”

Pierce scored 19 points, Kevin Garnett had 13 and Ray Allen bounced back from a seven-quarter shooting slump to score 12 points for Boston. But the new Big Three that led the Celtics to their unprecedented 17th NBA title in 2008— beating the Lakers in the finals—was on the bench for much of the fourth-quarter run that gave Boston the lead for good…

Nate Robinson scored 12 points in 17 minutes as the Celtics’ bench outscored the Lakers’ 36-18. Ten of L.A.’s bench points came from Lamar Odom, who played 39 minutes after starting center Andrew Bynum tested his sore knee but did not play in the second half…

Ray Allen finished 4 for 11 from the field—missing all four 3-pointers, but scored 10 points in the second half.

The Boston Globe blog reports:

“I just felt like a beast,’’ Davis said. “Really, I’m going to be honest with you. I just felt like I couldn’t be denied — rebound. If a rebound was in my vicinity, or like if the ball was going to be held up, you know, I just felt like I just couldn’t be denied.

“There’s not too many times you get a chance to be in the Finals and be a part of something so great that you can never really imagine yourself even being here. I just couldn’t be denied today.’’

Julian Benbow of the Boston Globe reports:

Rasheed Wallace was one of the catalysts in the fourth-quarter charge that helped the Celtics tie the NBA Finals at 2-2 with a 96-89 win over the Lakers last night, but he walked away from the win with his sixth technical foul of the playoffs, leaving him one shy of an automatic one-game suspension.

He picked up the technical with 7:25 to go in the fourth, exaggeratedly shocked at being called for a foul on Kobe Bryant under the basket. There have been times in the Finals when Wallace was so shocked by calls that his face lit up in equal parts surprise and outrage, high-stepping and dancing away from both the play and the officials.

Gary Washburn of the Boston Globe reports:

Bryant nearly found a way to carry the Lakers to victory last night, using long, contested 3-pointers as his weapon, but it wasn’t his preferred weapon. Bryant, of course, would rather dash to the basket for acrobatic layups, or drive, stop, and lean back for fadeaways.

The Celtics have to allow Kobe to score; they have no choice because he remains unstoppable. But they are using stifling defense to force Bryant into an uncomfortable zone. He looks irritated. He looks frustrated, just as he was when Artest missed his pass two consecutive times.

Bryant scored 33 points in the Celtics’ 96-89 Game 4 victory, but 18 came on 3-pointers. Bryant converted no layups; his closest field goal was from 9 feet. He is not creating baskets with his quickness and array of moves. The Celtics are sending two defenders at him and he is attempting shots in those small windows, such as the ones Artest missed in the second half.

Mike Bresnahan of the Los Angeles Times reports:

The Lakers found out Thursday how much Andrew Bynum meant to them, fading in the second half against the more physical Celtics, 96-89, and finding themselves pulled into a 2-2 deadlock in the Finals.

The Lakers’ center had only two points and three rebounds in 12 injury-shortened minutes, the 22-year-old unable to muster much because of a swollen right knee.

It didn’t help that the Celtics’ reserves thoroughly outplayed those of the Lakers, that Lamar Odom did next to nothing and Kobe Bryant looked fatigued, according to Coach Phil Jackson.

Mike Bresnahan of the Los Angeles Times reports:

Beyond Bryant and Gasol, Odom was the only other player in double figure-scoring for the Lakers, finishing with 10 points but taking only one rebound in 22 minutes in the second half.

The Lakers held a 45-42 edge at halftime but were eventually undone by scoring only 17 points in the third quarter and giving up 36 points in the fourth.

“They got all the energy points, the hustle points, second-chance points, points in the paint, beat us to the loose balls,” Bryant said. “I mean, that’s how the game turned around.”

Mark Heisler of the Los Angeles Times reports:

There was nothing subtle about it. The Celtics were more physical and played harder.

The Lakers went back into bug-on-the-Celtics-windshield mode.

With Bynum gone, Kendrick Perkins went back to pounding on Pau Gasol, who went into flamingo-in-a-cement-mixer mode with Lamar Odom in deer-in-headlights mode.

“I just felt like a beast,” said Davis. “I’ll be honest with you, I felt like I couldn’t be denied.”

The Celtics led, 85-77, when Boston Coach Doc Rivers put the regulars back in, by which time Wallace and Robinson had also drawn technical fouls for their unmatchable histrionics.

Celtics minority owner confronts David Stern over Finals officiating

Gary Washburn of the Boston Globe reports:

A Celtics minority owner could face a fine by the NBA after a verbal confrontation with commissioner David Stern following the Celtics’ 91-84 Game 3 loss to the Lakers Tuesday night at TD Garden.

According to multiple sources with knowledge of the encounter, Jim Pallotta, angry at the officiating that included three reviewed calls in the fourth quarter, confronted Stern and apparently said the league should be embarrassed at the officiating in the series.

Historically, owners who have been publicly critical of officials have received six-figure fines.

Stern told reporters at an NBA Cares event in Roxbury yesterday that it wouldn’t be Celtics-Lakers without complaints about the officiating. The NBA officially had no comment on the incident, while a Celtics spokesman said he was unaware of it.

Both NBA Finals teams complaining about fouls

Jeff Miller of the Orange County Register reports:

There’s a whistle and the Lakers complain.

There’s another whistle and the Celtics complain.

Sometimes there’s a whistle and both teams complain. And both coaches and benches and, who knows, maybe even dance teams.

Hey, NBA Finals. Put a sweat sock in it! Shut up and play already!

Is it just us or have the Lakers and Celtics taken crying to new and off-putting heights in this series? We know Big Baby is playing, but we didn’t realize a bunch of babies were, too.

Frankly, these Finals need to be burped.

“You have big, beasty, angry guys all on edge and slightly out of control,” Lakers guard Shannon Brown said. “You’re getting poked and grabbed. Your butt’s getting blindsided. I would say it’s pretty normal, actually.”

Doc Rivers calls Derek Fisher a flopper

Mark Murphy of the Boston Herald reports:

While Lakers guard Derek Fisher drew raves for his hounding of Allen in Game 3, and his ability to fight through screens and draw fouls in particular, Doc Rivers wasn’t amused.

“Derek? Besides flopping, he doesn’t do a lot extra,” said Rivers, who spent most of the morning talking about fouls and how the first three games have been officiated. “He plays hard. He’s been in the game long enough to understand. I thought he got away with a lot (Tuesday) night. I thought there was a lot of holding going on and a lot of flopping going on, and finally he showed that last one.

“But he’s good at it, he’s always been good at it. We knew that going into the series. He’s one of the best charge takers in the game. He’s always been that. And some of them are charges and then some of them are flops, but all of them are tough to call.

“It is a brutal call to make, it really is a tough one.”

Bryant, Fisher lead Lakers to victory in Finals Game 3

The AP reports:

Derek Fisher rallied his teammates with a motivational speech on the bench during the break before the fourth quarter.

Then he went out and showed them how it’s done.

“Derek, he’s our vocal leader. He’s the guy that pulls everybody together and is always giving positive reinforcement,” Lakers guard Kobe Bryant said after Fisher made five baskets in the final period to lead Los Angeles to a 91-84 victory Tuesday night over the Boston Celtics and a 2-1 lead in the NBA finals…

Bryant scored 29 points and Fisher had 16, including 11 in the fourth quarter after Boston cut a 17-point first-half lead to one point…

Bryant had 25 points after three quarters, but he did not score for the first 10 minutes of the fourth. That’s when Fisher took over, hitting four out of five Lakers baskets to help them reclaim the home-court advantage they lost when the Celtics won Game 2 in L.A…

Pau Gasol and Andrew Bynum had 10 rebounds apiece for Los Angeles.

Kevin Garnett, who had just six points in Boston’s victory Sunday, had 25 in Game 3. But Allen, who had 32 points in Game 2, missed all 13 field goal attempts—one shy of the NBA finals futility record—many of them while Fisher was guarding him…

The Lakers opened a 37-20 first-half lead, but Boston cut the deficit to four late in the third quarter and then made it 68-67 early in the fourth on consecutive drives by Glen “Big Baby” Davis and Rajon Rondo. With a chance to take the lead, Allen was called for an offensive foul away from the ball…

Allen missed all eight 3-pointers, all five 2-pointers and got to the line just twice.

Nate Robinson a Finals spark for Celtics

Baxter Holmes of the Los Angeles Times reports:

Nate Robinson providing spark for Celtics in Finals

On Sunday night in Game 2 of the NBA Finals, a 103-94 Celtics win, Nate Robinson caught fire again, giving his team seven points in just six minutes during a tight fourth quarter.

He started the fourth with the score tied, 72-72, and replaced point guard Rajon Rondo, who had played all 36 minutes to that point and was “exhausted,” according to Celtics Coach Doc Rivers.

“Yeah, I needed it,” Rondo said of a breather.

At the 8-minute, 59-second mark, Robinson pulled up for a three-pointer at the top of the key that gave the Celtics the lead, 81-80. A steal by fellow Celtics guard Tony Allen on the other end led to a fast-break Robinson layup on the break 24 seconds later.

A few minutes later, he was fouled by Lakers center Andrew Bynum and converted two free throws.

Lamar Odom invisible in Finals games 1 and 2

Bill Plaschke of the Los Angeles Times reports:

Lamar Odom is not only one of the most genuinely good guys in all of Los Angeles sports, but also one of the most maddening. The Lakers need him, but, even after six years here, they don’t really know him. Even this spring, while he’s finally wearing one of their rings, they haven’t figured him out.

Is he the guy who finished so well against Oklahoma City, or who had trouble getting started against Utah? Is he the guy who went for 19 points and 19 rebounds against Phoenix or was he, as the Suns’ Amare Stoudemire said, just lucky?

So far in the Finals, he’s been neither. So far, he’s been less involved than Dustin Hoffman. With the series tied at one game apiece, he’s averaging four points and five rebounds in an average of 18 foul-ridden minutes per game.

From the moment one of Kobe Bryant’s passes bounced oddly off his chest in Game 1, Odom hasn’t been able to match the moment. Is his cluttered head there? Is his bruised body there? We know the Kardashian family is there, and that’s enough to make anyone lose his marbles.