DJ Injuries Wrist in Win
Some nights, winning isn't everything. The Celtics absorbed that painful lesson last night when an injury to their floor leader, Dennis Johnson, overshadowed the pounding they administered to the Sacramento Kings.
After their 118-101 Garden blowout of the NBA's newest relocated franchise, the Celtics learned that Johnson had suffered a possible hairline fracture of his left wrist. He left the floor in pain during the second quarter and was brought to University Hospital, where X-rays were taken and the wrist was placed in a splint.
The extent of Johnson's injury won't be known until this morning. The damage is in the navicular area of his left thumb. Celtics physician Thomas Silva isn't sure whether this is a recurrence of the hairline fracture Johnson suffered in 1984, an injury that required three X-rays to detect and left Johnson in a cast for eight weeks.
Silva's examination will determine whether Johnson can return to the lineup within 10 days or whether he'll be in a cast for several weeks. It's possible that the injury is a hyperextension, in which case a week to 10 days of rest and treatment would be the cure. That's the optimistic point of view, assuming that Johnson aggravated the old injury. But if this is a new fracture, the eight-week timetable would likely apply.
According to trainer Ray Melchiorre, Johnson was hurt when someone yanked his thumb as he went up for a rebound.
"We won't know anything until the morning," said Silva, "when we can compare the pictures we took tonight with the old ones. If it's the old one, it might be something he can play with very soon.
"Bill Walton has a similar type of fracture that he is playing with. The difference is that Walton has had it since he was in high school and has lived with it. Dennis has not and was in a lot of pain when he left the floor."
Veteran Jerry Sichting will replace Johnson in the starting backcourt with Danny Ainge, and Rick Carlisle and rookie Sam Vincent figure to get more playing time. But coach K.C. Jones knows this is not the way his backcourt works best.
"Danny is going to have the job of guarding the other team's big scorer," said Jones. "It's tough, but he's done it before. Jerry is a veteran and has been there before."
Sichting said he would accept the challenge, but added he wasn't happy about the way it came about. "You hate to get playing time because of somebody's injury," he said. "But on the other hand, when you're a sub, you have to be ready for these situations."
"DJ is so tough," said Kevin McHale. "He brings the ball up the floor under pressure. It helps Danny a great deal to have someone with him who has great control. It's a twofold thing. We'll miss DJ a lot. But we'll also miss the influence he has on Danny, who is playing so fantastic right now."
Fantastic best described the way the Celtics went after Sacramento. In the first three quarters, Boston shot to a 33-point lead, with Larry Bird pumping in 21 of his 24 points.
The Kings kept it close for one period, trailing by six points. Boston pushed the lead to 20 at halftime, 68-48, and put the game on ice in the third period by outscoring Sacramento, 36-23. Only a 30-14 Kings' advantage in the final 12 minutes of garbage time made the final relatively close.
"It was a butt-whipping," said Sacramento's Reggie Theus. "How long did we have control of the game? About 30 seconds."
Actually, it was about six minutes. Then an 18-13 Sacramento lead vanished in a nine-point Celtics' rush. After the Kings tied the game, 22-22, Boston went on a 10-4 surge to close out the period and never looked back.
Bird made sure of that by hitting 6 of 8 shots in the second period, including his first two three-pointers since Nov. 20. Bird had gone 0 for 15 until he connected on a corner shot with 7:08 left in the period. It was the first of three long bombs that strung together would have reached the wall at Fenway Park. Bird followed that with an 18-footer moments later.
With six minutes left before halftime, he hit his second three-pointer and showed the Kings what they were up against. Bird came down with a rebound after a missed shot and was slapped in the face and eye by a couple of Kings, with no foul being called. Undaunted, he raced up the floor with the ball, stopped and popped a 26-footer as if it were a layup.
The Kings never knew what hit them. If they were expecting to face the same team that barely beat Atlanta Tuesday night (114-110), they got a bad scouting report.
"We rebounded a lot better tonight," said Celtics center Robert Parish, who had a field day running against the slower Kings big men. "They weren't making an effort to get back. We had a lot of three-on-one, four-on-two situations and we were able to break the game wide open.
"The thing is that this is the first time in a long while that we got a lead and kept it. We didn't get away from what got us the lead. We kept pushing the ball up and showed a lot of patience. We got it inside and we didn't start off by taking all those outside shots."
Parish added that the narrow victory over Atlanta was all the Celtics needed to realize they couldn't take anyone for granted.
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