To begin Game 2, Paul Pierce dominated the Atlanta Hawks
defense with 4 made field goals on the Boston Celtics’ first 5 possessions of
the game. Pierce scored the Celtics’ first 9 points and had the potential for
even more production in the first half, but the Hawks were able to stymie the
point forward. On both of the next 2 possessions, Pierce turned the ball over.
Then, he only scored 4 points in his next 14 minutes of game time. The captain would end up with 8 turnovers in
total on the night, his most turnovers in a game in the 2011-12 regular season
and playoffs. In fact, Pierce became the first Celtic to commit that many
turnovers in a postseason game since Antoine Walker did it in 2005.
However, the 8 turnovers were due in part to Pierce having to handle the ball
so often on a night without Boston’s starting point guard.
Nevertheless, you have to take the bad with the good because
The Truth went for a total of 36 points and 14 rebounds. For the third time in his career, he scored at least 35 points and grabbed
at least 10 rebounds in the same postseason game. Pierce is also the only
Celtic to accumulate those numbers in the playoffs in the last 20 years.
Impressively enough, he did this against a team he has recently struggled
against. Coming into Tuesday night, Pierce was shooting only 28.8% (15 for 52)
against the Hawks this season (including Game 1 of the series), his worst field
goal percentage against any team in 2011-12. He shot 46.2% (12 for 26) on Tuesday
in Atlanta. What a night it was the 34-year-old.
While most of the spotlight was on Pierce’s remarkable
performance, the Celtics lockdown defense deserves admiration, too. After allowing the Hawks to hit 3 of 7
three-pointers in the first quarter, Boston held Atlanta to only 3 of 15
shooting from long range for the rest of the game. The Celtics showed why
they had the best shooting defense during the 2011-12 regular season. This was
especially evident in the fourth quarter when the Hawks shot 0 for 4 from deep
and 4 for 19 overall for only 14 total points. The outstanding defensive accomplishments by the Celtics led them to only
their fourth road win after trailing at the end of a third quarter during the
2011-12 regular season and playoffs. Entering Tuesday’s game, Boston had a
winning percentage of less than 15% when trailing at the end of the third
quarter on the road this season. In addition, before relinquishing their
double-digit lead, the Hawks had a winning percentage of more than 90% when
leading at the end of the third quarter at home this season. When examining
those percentages, the Celtics comeback is even more extraordinary.
As with Game 1 of
this series, when it rains, it pours for the losing team. Near the end of Game
2, Josh Smith left the court with a patella injury and did not return. After
having an MRI exam on Wednesday in Atlanta revealing patellar tendinitis, he
may miss Friday night’s game. This
injury could prevent Smith from continuing his 43-game streak of starting postseason
games to begin his career. The
26-year-old has been notably healthy during his first 8 seasons, missing only
40 regular season games (6.25%) out of 640. He started all 66 games of the
lockout-shortened season and only missed 5 of the 82 games in 2010-11. If he
does miss Game 3 at the TD Garden, it could prove costly for the already
shorthanded Hawks. In the 5 games that
Smith was out last season, Atlanta was 1-4 with an average differential of
negative 11 points. In the last few years, the Hawks have played terribly
without him, so they should hope he does not come back too quickly.
If the Celtics
defense was the unheralded feature of their exciting comeback, then what allowed
that to transpire was Doc Rivers’ confidence in his lineup down the stretch. For the last 10 minutes and 22 seconds of Game
2, it was Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett, Avery Bradley, Mickael Pietrus and
Marquis Daniels. Doc sat Brandon Bass for the entire fourth quarter in
favor of a stronger defensive lineup. Daniels
made a major impact on both ends of the floor and led all players in Tuesday’s
game with a plus/minus of positive 11.
When the Celtics
signed Daniels in September 2009, they thought he would make a major impact in
the 2010 playoffs. Unfortunately, he did not make it into the rotation for that
postseason. Daniels played in less than half of the games in the 2010 playoffs.
Then his 2010-11 season came to a crashing halt when he suffered a
life-threatening neck injury against the Orlando Magic on February 6, 2011. Who knew that it would be in his third
season with the Celtics that Daniels would play a crucial role in a postseason
game? Daniels made a miraculous return to be with the Celtics in 2011-12
and it has already paid dividends. With Rajon Rondo returning from his
suspension, Daniels may not even play the rest of the Hawks series. We may not
even see him in crunch time for the rest of the playoffs, but he is always
ready to play. If an injury, a
suspension or anything else arises, Marquis Daniels could be an important
factor going forward in the 2012 playoffs.
