The Celtics suffered a tough beat on Sunday afternoon in Miami. The Heat shot the lights out, the C's lost their composure and the game got away from them in the fourth quarter, despite their countless attempts to make a run.
Now they've got to regroup. There's still plenty of time to bounce back.
Here are seven thoughts on the Celtics and their bid to get back into this Eastern Conference semifinal series.
1. It's only been one game, but this series already feels eerily reminiscent of the 2010 Finals, in that both head coaches are already using the media to publicly lobby the referees. The same way Doc Rivers and Phil Jackson went back and forth over officiating last June, Doc and Erik Spoelstra are doing the same thing now. Case in point: Doc pushed hard in his postgame presser to have James Jones' foul on Paul Pierce upgraded to a flagrant, while Coach Spo insisted in his that "that play happens all the time."
(Bear in mind, though, that it's silly for either side to fixate on the refs. The Heat won this game by nine. It wasn't because of any one particular call — the better team just won.)
2. If it were anyone else, Dwyane Wade's 38-point outburst against the Celtics to win Game 1 would be impressive. But with Wade, there's a higher standard — the Miami superstar has already churned out six 40-plus games in the playoffs in his career, including a whopping 46 in Game 4 against Boston last year. Wade's one of only four active players in the NBA with six or more games of 40-plus, and three of the four are playing in this series. LeBron James, Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant are the other three.
3. James Jones' 25 points off the bench are not only a career playoff high, but they're almost a career high for any game. He's topped 25 only once in his career, scoring 27 on Nov. 28, 2004, in a Pacers loss to the Sonics. And that one should barely count — basically the entire game was garbage time, since the Pacers' three best players were suspended due to a certain altercation in Detroit a week earlier. In other words, crazy things have to happen for James Jones to score 25-plus points in an NBA game.
4. Going into Sunday afternoon, Chris Bosh has exactly zero career points beyond the first round of the playoffs. Going into Tuesday, though? He has exactly seven. The power forward matchup was really a non-issue for both teams in Game 1 — Bosh finished with seven points on 3-of-10 shooting, and Kevin Garnett finished with a strikingly similar six on 3-of-9. Garnett averages 18.7 points per game for his career; Bosh averages 16.3 against Garnett. Perhaps a little regression to the mean is due in Game 2.
5. One bright spot for the Celtics: Ray Allen just refuses to stop hitting 3's. He drained five more in eight attempts Sunday, bringing him to 22 trifectas in five games so far in this postseason. That's a pretty insane number. In case you're wondering, the all-time record for 3's in a single postseason is 58, held by Reggie Miller in 2000; second is Ray, with 57 a year later. And to think — Ray's already taken one record from the former Pacer this year …
6. Crazy fact: This is the first time in 28 years we've seen seven current All-Stars in a single playoff series. LeBron, Wade, Bosh, Pierce, Garnett, Allen and Rajon Rondo made up seven of the East's 12 this year. But even crazier: There are five more former All-Stars in this series. Shaquille O'Neal, Jermaine O'Neal, Zydrunas Ilgauskas, Juwan Howard and Jamal Magloire have all played in the All-Star Game, too. That means that of the 24 players active in this series (or at least Shaq will be active, at some point), exactly half are All-Stars. That just might be a first.
7. Not to keep harping on this, but it needs to be said: The Kendrick Perkins trade looked pretty friggin' terrible for both teams on Sunday afternoon. The Celtics traded Perk for Jeff Green this season because they needed another athlete to guard opposing wing scorers, and yet Miami's wing trio of LeBron-Wade-J.J. dropped a combined 85 on them in Game 1. The Thunder traded Green for Perk because they wanted defense and toughness inside, and yet they got eaten alive inside by Zach Randolph and Marc Gasol.
But playoff series are decided in seven games, not one. There's still plenty of time for Perk, Green and everyone else in this wacky postseason to straighten things out.
