Celtics Handle Business, Blowout Pacers by 26
It’s fun when the Celtics win a game… Especially when that win is a blowout against an Eastern Conference team with a winning record. Tonight, the Celtics easily took care of business beating the Indiana Pacers by a final score of 114-88.
Leading the Celtics scoring efforts was captain Paul Pierce with 32 points, but many Celtics played very well tonight. Every member of the team who was dressed played, and played early. In particular, I was impressed with the efforts of Kendrick Perkins with his 12 points, 8 rebounds and 4 blocks. Ryan Gomes had another double double night which was also a great, great effort.
Delonte West struggled to find a groove from the shooting guard spot on the floor with his one for five shooting performance creating just two points. Still, his efforts allowed Boston to build a lead through the second half with his five rebounds, three assists and three steals. The Celtics had four players scoring in double digits… Pierce with 32, Szczerbiak with 20, and Gomes and Perkins each with 12.
My Keys to the Win…
• Outscored Indiana in every quarter, in particular the third quarter when they outscored Indiana by 12. That helps to kill any game plan that Indiana could have had coming out of the locker room.
• The Celtics played aggressive defense — 10 Steals, 7 Blocks, and had solid fouls throughout, holding Indiana to 38% shooting.
• Celtics (finally) won the turnover battle (+1)
• Solid time distribution for everyone. Everyone that dressed played, and Pierce played 32 minutes vs. his 42 minutes in the Orlando loss.
• Offensive boards… Celtics had 13 offensive boards compared to the Pacers 6.
• Great ball movement throughout the game, especially with the smaller lineups. In tonight’s game there was more than one guy on the offensive end of the floor moving without the ball and I don’t remember seeing that much before at all.
• Finally — I’ve been on Pierce ’s case about being the cause for some losses. Tonight I’ll eat my words and give him his props… he played very well and made very few mistakes for the C’s tonight.
The Celtics return to action on Friday night to play the Blazers in Boston at 7:30PM.
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