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Bench Warmer
On the day he was named an All-Star, Ray Allen was treated like a rookie on the final play of the game. At least that's the way he saw it.
Derek Fisher? He didn't quite agree.
Allen had a chance to hit a second straight game-winning 3-pointer, two nights after he did it in Philadelphia, but his last-second attempt fluttered toward the basket like a dying quail (or a Ben Wallace free throw) and never got anywhere near the net, sending the crowd home angry, leaving Allen feeling as though he was robbed and allowing the Lakers to be able to boast that they had ended the Celtics' 12-game winning streak right in the center of Beantown after snapping Boston's 19-game winning streak back in Los Angels on Christmas Day.
"I was fouled on it. I was pushed, and I think I did twist my ankle (on the release)," Allen said. "I got pushed into the shot, but what can you do about it? It was on the side, and he rode me into that shot.
"I've always said at end of games referees let you play. You set screens that somewhat may be murderous out there, and guys scream and complain about it, but I do think referees do let us play at the end of games," Allen said. "What was disappointing about this one was when Kevin got his fifth foul, such a chippy foul, and it somewhat set the tone of how the rest of the game was going to be played. And then when it comes down to a shot that's going to determine, everybody swallows (their whistles)."
Garnett's fifth foul came with 6:14 remaining, and he went out with his sixth foul -- a legitimate call after he shoved Fisher after Pau Gasol slapped the ball away -- just under two minutes later, leaving the Celtics to play the final 9 1/2 minutes of the 110-109 overtime loss without their emotional and defensive leader.
From there, the defending champs were anything but the picture of confidence and cool, the two most egregious instances of making the wrong decision at the wrong time coming from Paul Pierce, who twice passed the ball to Glen Davis for important shots in the final two minutes of regulation, with Davis missing both times.
The Celtics also had a poor possession on the final play of regulation, managing to get off only an off-balance fling by Eddie House after inbounding with the score tied at 101 with 7.7 seconds left.
At the end of overtime, Davis committed a loose ball foul against Lamar Odom after having his shot blocked by Gasol, and Odom's two free throws turned a 109-108 deficit into a 110-109 lead with 16 seconds left.
The Lakers had a foul to give, and Fisher gave it with 3.0 seconds left. Then came the play on which Allen claimed he was fouled, quickly inbounding the pass to Davis and then getting the ball back and driving to his right, stopping above the top of the key to squeeze off what would have been the game-winner.
"Well, I knew if he was taking the ball out, I knew it was coming to him. Any basketball player in the world would know that if you need a shot at the end of the game, you're not going to have Ray Allen inbound the ball and then just watch. So I told Pau that the dribble handoff was coming, and as Davis stepped to the ball and handed off, I tried to make sure I busted through over the top to keep Ray going and having to shoot off the move. But it was Pau's length that really made it difficult for him to get a good look at he basket," Fisher said.
"How much contact did I make?" Fisher asked, repeating a follow-up question. "I don't think I made any contact with him. As he caught the ball, we were running together and I was getting through (the screen). So if that's a foul, I guess so, but in terms of when he goes into the shooting motion, there's definitely no contact there. But the game wasn't decided only by that one particular play."
Indeed it wasn't, but the defensive aspect of how it ended was reflective of an increased level of intensity from the Lakers when they didn't have the ball -- especially in comparison to the last time they visited this building, that night back in June (Phil Jackson claimed not to remember any of it, citing "amnesia") when their season ended with a 39-point defeat at the hands of these very same Celtics.
Los Angeles held Boston to 45 percent shooting, scored 24 points off 16 turnovers, held the Celtics to just 20 points in both the first and fourth quarters, used Kobe Bryant extensively as the primary defender on Rajon Rondo and allowed Boston to have only a two-point advantage (50-48) in points in the paint -- that last item being one of the most important, with the loss of Andrew Bynum having left them as vulnerable inside defensively as they were last June when the Celtics dispatched them in six games.
So the Lakers emerge from this one not only with the league's best record (40-9), but also with an unblemished 5-0 mark on a lengthy road trip that wraps up Sunday in Cleveland, where they'll try to become the first team to defeat the Cavs at the Q this season. They also have the tiebreaker edge over the Celtics should the two reach the Finals again, plus the knowledge that the right combination of defensive intensity and last-second defensive savvy (Fisher keeping Allen off-balance, foul or no foul) can at times be relied upon to replace what Bynum had been bringing.
"It was a statement game more for ourselves, knowing we didn't necessarily play well for three quarters and still managed to find a way to win his game," Kobe Bryant said.
Pierce's take: "The thing we've got to realize is it's not the end of the world. It's still a long season, our goals are still the same, nothing changes. It'd have been nice to get this win if it comes down to a tiebreaker, but it shows we've still got work to do, and we will continue to do it."
