That's just about as heartbreaking as the last game 7 I watched. I just don't know what to say. My mind is blown. In every other loss, you can really point to someone who played poorly for the Celtics -- or a number of them. And you could point to someone who lit it up for LA. Didn't happen tonight. Celtics played pretty well, Lakers played a little bit better. We got toasted on the boards, maybe in part because of the loss of Perkins. We were unable to make up for it. It's a really, really, REALLY tough loss to handle, and the real passionate Boston sports fans like myself will have a tough time just stepping back and looking at the bigger picture here. But I'm at least going to try.
Bring yourself back to game 1 of the first round of these playoffs. How confident were you that these Celtics would get past the Heat? Alright, maybe you were pretty confident. But you were almost sure that LeBron and the Cavs would take them down after that. And if somehow, miraculously, these old hags got through the King, they could never impede the flight of Superman down in Orlando. Not a chance in hell. And then if there was any absurd series of events that landed them in the finals against Kobe and the big bad Lakers -- kiss your hopes goodbye. Well, the Celtics defied the odds on that entire sequence right up until the final moments of game 7 in these finals.
You're kidding yourself if you say that the Celtics disappointed this season. It's really unfortunate that KG was out injured last postseason, because I believe we would have won it again. But a year later, a year older, and another year that seems to make Ray's jumper more inconsistent -- make Pierce's drive to the basket a step slower -- make Garnett's post move a few notches weaker -- we just didn't have it. The rebuilding stage is beginning, folks -- like it or not. From a managerial standpoint, as much as you hate to admit it, Ray Allen may have played his final game wearing green. You need to transition out of the "Big Three" at some point, and the preference would be to do it one at a time. Don't dump all three at once.
It was the unlikely heros for the Lakers tonight. Ron Artest's three pointer just outside 1 minute to play was probably the biggest shot of the game. Close to a dagger. But the C's kept fighting. They didn't say die. Gotta admire their grit, but it just wasn't happening tonight. They weren't tough enough, weren't strong enough on the boards. Hats off to the Lakers -- they did the things they needed to do to win game 7.
Of course, that isn't to say I think everything was played out fairly tonight. The officiating, once again, was on the Lakers' side -- in my opinion. Boston was in the penalty before the halfway mark of the fourth quarter. It's how the Lakers claimed and built their lead. Free throws. A very one-sided fourth quarter. But I make no excuses, and I'm very clear about that. This was Boston's game to win, and they just weren't able to do it. LA played great defense at the critical moments of the game. For once, we saw a true team effort out of the Lakers.
That's right. A team effort. It wasn't the Kobe show tonight. In fact, Kobe played one of the worst games of his career. In game 7 of the NBA finals. How exactly does that happen? Would Jordan have thrown up a stinker in this game? Once again, my personal opinion -- Kobe is not on Jordan's level yet. He didn't win this game for the Lakers and thus, he didn't win this series for the Lakers. They ultimately won as a team.
Boston has a long offseason to think about this one. It stings. The worst pain that any of them have felt in the Big Three era. But they need to move on. Garnett, Pierce, and Allen (if he returns) are in the final stages of their careers where they need to capitalize on their last shots at championship runs. There's no time to dwell on the failure. Get right back to work, with whatever you've got, and prevent the purple and gold from a dynastically impressive 3-peat.
One last thing though. I still can't figure out why rapists win championships. Is there a God somewhere up there?
Kobe is absolutely on jordan's level... everyone has bad games and kobe played this entire series averaging almost 30 ppg... Kobe played a shitty game and still was a key factor in winning it down the stretch... he hit numerous high pressure free throws late in the game, and banged down a couple big jumpers
ReplyDeletePlus, we didn't even watch basketball when Jordan played so you don't know when he had bad games in the finals because all we see is highlights...
Kobe plays with the same killer instinct as jordan, he's won almost as many championships as jordan, he's a better shooter than jordan ever was, overall he plays the game very similar to jordan... He's the basically the modern day Jordan, he's reached that level of greatness