If you bleed Green and smoke Hoyo de Monterreys in honor of Red, you want to bottle this energy and precision and start the Finals tonight in Los Angeles. What we are seeing on the parquet floorboards is awe-inspiring, almost frightening.
The Celtics destroyed the Orlando Magic, 94-71, in Game 3 of the conference finals last night. In the name of Bill Russell and Sam Jones, the old guard of 2010 is now one victory shy of a destined finale with the sons of Jerry West and Elgin Baylor.
Some day this will all make sense. We will look back at the season of 2009-2010 and wonder why there was any concern about the pedestrian (50-32) regular-season Celtics. We will clearly see that the fourth-place finish in the Eastern Conference and all the blown double-digit leads meant nothing. We will wonder how we ever doubted them.
But right now it’s a daily miracle. The Celtics exposed LeBron James and the heavily favored Cavaliers in the second round. Now it’s Orlando’s turn and it is downright ugly for the guys from the ugly wasteland of mid-Florida. Boston’s Game 3 lead peaked at 32 points.
Forget about the 3-0 hockey jinx. The Celtics are not the Bruins and the Magic are not the Philadelphia Flyers. Not even close. No NBA team has ever rebounded from a 3-0 deficit and the 2010 Magic have clinched North America’s Milk-Bone Dog Biscuit Award for 2010.
St. Louis had its Gas House Gang with the 1934 Cardinals. Orlando has the Gas Pipe Gang with the 2010 Magic. After going 8-0 in the first two rounds of the playoffs, the Magic are 0-3 and ready to get swept tomorrow night. Orlando has a roster of frauds with some explaining to do:
■Superman Dwight Howard is Super Bad. And we mean bad in the literal sense of the word. Howard scored 7 points with 7 rebounds in 39 minutes of Game 3. Credit the Celtic defense.
■Rashard Lewis, who makes north of $18 million, has a three-game total of 15 points on 6-of-24 shooting (1-13 from 3-point range). Credit the Celtic defense again.
■Vince Carter, who blew a chance at winning Game 2 by missing a couple of free throws in the final minute, responded by going 0 for 4 as the Celtics went ahead by 16 in the first quarter. Carter didn’t put the ball in the basket until the 18th minute of the first half just after the Celtics went ahead, 43-19.
■Jason Williams was badly outhustled when Rajon Rondo hit the floor for a loose ball on a fast break. While Williams slept, Rondo skidded on the floor, corralled the ball, got up, and scored. It was one of the great plays in Celtic lore (“If that doesn’t give your whole team energy, nothing will,’’ said Doc Rivers), but it also demonstrated that maybe Williams spent too much time with Randy Moss in high school.
