With three and a half minutes left in the Celtics-Cavs game the other night the score was 87-80 Boston. I turned to my friend in the seat next to me and said "The Celtics only need to score 6 more points to win this game." As it turned out they didn't make another basket, and Cleveland came back to win 88-87. Losing by one point when the other team closes the game on a 12-0 run (it was 87-76 with 4:24 to go) is a pretty tough pill to swallow; but as I left the Garden I was surprised how unconcerned I was by it. After an improbable 4 game winning streak, I had a feeling Boston might be due for a let down. And if they'd made another shot or two down the stretch and won this particular game, does that really have any impact on whether or not they can beat good teams come playoff time? I'm just going to give the Celtics a mulligan on this one and choose not to dwell on it. As soon as a I saw Kyrie Irving start to dribble out the clock with 22 seconds left I had a sinking feeling in my stomach. Normally teams go for the last shot when the game is tied, not when they're down a point. Traditional hoops wisdom tells you to take the best shot you can with some time left on the clock, that way you still have a chance if it doesn't go in. It was a ballsy call by Cavs coach Byron Scott.
For my regular readers who are not big Celtics/NBA fans, I apologize. Tomorrow's blog will not be about sports, I promise! But I have been getting a lot of traffic and support lately from other Celtics related media, so that may be the general direction in which this site is heading.
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