Bench Rescues Celtics from Rough Start in Opener

By Peter F. Stringer
October 27, 2009
Celtics.com

CLEVELAND - Most NBA teams spend their free agency dollars looking for starters. Championship contenders spend their money on sixth men and role players for the bench.

After just one game, the early returns on the Rasheed Wallace and Marquis Daniels signings are in, and dividends were paid Tuesday night as the Celtics' bench turned the game around and helped knock off the Cavs on opening night, 95-89.

Coach Doc Rivers said he didn't remind his team of the last game they played in Cleveland, a 107-76 Easter Sunday dismantling at the Quicken Loans Arena that hit the team hard as they prepared for the postseason last spring. But he didn't need to, either; the hype was impossible to escape. Unable to nap, Ray Allen sat in his hotel room Tuesday afternoon channel surfing, and every click of the remote seemed to have the same story, that the Celtics had lost their last eight games in Cleveland.

So on opening night for the NBA, home court in the Eastern Conference was already at stake against LeBron James and Shaquille O'Neal. In the unlikely event that they'd forgotten, a 13-2 Cleveland run to start the game was probably the only reminder they would need. But while the Celtics starters seemed to have trouble settling in, the bench was ready to stop the bleeding in the second quarter and they actually built a lead while they were at it, too.

"We talked about it before the game, trying to handle their intensity early. We knew they were gonna come out jacked up," Rivers said of the Cavs opening salvo. "I didn't know they were gonna come out 13-2. But we never really panicked. We just chipped away at it."

"The second unit saved the game for us," Rivers added. "Don't lose sight of, as well as our bench scored, they got stops, and that's what kept them on the floor. When they can get stops, they're gonna score."

The comeback was spurred by defense, 3-pointers and some aggressive play from Ray Allen, who knocked down a pair of treys after struggling early (0-for-2 in the first quarter) and at one point blew by five Cavs for a layup while scoring 11 of his 16 points in the second quarter. The Celtics outscored the Cavs 30-17 in the period, driven largely by a bench that outscored the Cleveland reserves 17-4 in the half.

"In our eyes, we feel like we have one of the best, if not the best bench in the league," Pierce said, noting that role players on this team are comparable to most team's starters. "These guys are getting the job done. We saw it all through training camp, all through preseason, and it showed tonight."

Wallace, the four-time All-Star who anchored the second unit and closed the game with the starters, successfully spreading the floor in the process, told reporters straight up after the game that the Celtics' bench was better than Cleveland's reserves. Given the 26-10 bench scoring disparity in favor of Boston, it's hard to argue with him.

"The way that I feel, our bench is better than theirs," Wallace said. "Even though they played a hell of a game, and I'm not taking anything away from them, but I just think we wanted it a little bit more tonight."

Meanwhile, when the starters returned to the floor after the bench turned the game around, Pierce found the range from downtown, drilling a pair of threes, and the C's went on to shoot 7-of-9 from behind the arc in the half. The Celtics went into halftime with a 51-45 lead, and returned to the court in the third to build their lead, pressing the advantage to as many as 14 midway through the stanza.

Making his highly anticipated return to regular season play, Kevin Garnett had a quiet first half, posting four points and three rebounds in his first 13:59 of action. Garnett, who finished with 13 points, 10 rebounds and three blocks, still appeared tentative at times and missed an open tomahawk dunk that he'd like to have back. Still, he improved as the game wore on and responded to a Shaq takedown at the basket (O'Neal basically engulfed KG's head inside his biceps to prevent a layup) by getting up and pounding his chest.

"I think physically, I'm OK. I'd like to be better, and through the course of the season I'm sure I will be," Garnett said after the game. "It felt good to be out there. It didn't feel good to be down so early, but I thought once we sort of beat the emotional part of the game, settled in and got into our schemes, I thought we were pretty solid."

The C's picked up where they left off at the end of the first half, going to Perkins and Garnett down low and ripping off a quick 10-2 run to build a 61-47 lead with 9:20 to play in the third. But the Cavs stormed back and drew within seven points heading into the fourth, where the pace slowed considerably and the defenses tightened up.

For the Cavs, O'Neal made his presence felt early (eight points, six rebounds in the first half), but as the game wore on his impact diminished; he finished with a quiet, at least by Shaq's standards, 10 points and 10 rebounds. And as the C's clung to a single-digit lead in the closing minutes of the game, Rivers sat center Kendrick Perkins and put Wallace on the floor with the starters, spreading the floor and giving Pierce room to operate.

With Rondo and four shooters on the floor, the Cavs couldn't afford to double anyone. So while the Celtics showed a new dimension that Cleveland couldn't answer, predictably, the Cavs reverted to their old crunch time habits -- get LeBron the ball, stand around and watch him play one-on-five.

KG's high kiss off the glass against Shaq, a turnaround banker that glanced off the top off the backboard made it 87-79 Celtics with 2:45 to go, and even when the Cavs cut the lead to four, James clanged an ill-advised threeball off the iron, and Pierce hit a top of the key jumper , making it 89-83 with 1:03 left. On the next trip down, Pierce went to his sweet spot, the right elbow jumper to make it 91-84 Celtics and essentially seal the win.