More and more the story of this series is the breadth and depth of the Celtics, who have not relied on any one, two, or even five players to grab this 3-2 series lead. Last night, Paul Pierce (27 points), Kevin Garnett (18 points, 10 rebounds, 5 steals) and Rajon Rondo (18 points, 8 assists and 5 rebounds, but let’s not talk about the seven turnovers) had strong games. Rasheed Wallace was big off the bench. Nate Robinson, a.k.a. the Donkey, had his moments. As for Shrek, sometimes known as Glen “Big Baby’’ Davis, he had no points and three rebounds. Maybe tomorrow.
The Celtics have played 10 playoff games against the Lakers in 2008 and 2010 and Kobe Bryant has gone off just twice. He hit them for 36 points in Game 3 back in ’08, capping the performance with some game-changing plays. The Celtics could live with everything he did in the next seven games, and they had to be feeling good after he had another big struggle in the first half last night, shooting an ugly 4 for 12 as his team entered the locker room trailing 45-39.
But you can never get cocky with this guy. He is proud and he is relentless. Oh, and he’s pretty good, too, as he reminded the Celtics by shooting 7 of 9 in the third quarter, all jumpers and three or four of them borderline outrageous. It was truly the Kobe of legend.
“Kobe struggled in the first half,’’ said Phil Jackson. “The second half, I thought he was his dynamic self again and got us back and going.’’
But all he was able to do was keep the Celtics from putting the game out of sight. He was keeping his team in the game, but he was not winning the game. When he began his astonishing run his team was down by 4 (41-37), and when he scored the last of those 23 points his team was down by 9 (67-58) on its way to being down by 13. The Celtics (that’s plural) were matching Kobe. The Celtics were busy scoring on 12 of their first 13 second-half possessions.
This did not escape Doc Rivers’s attention.
