Attention, Mr. and Mrs. America and all the ships at sea: The Celtics slapped the San Antonio Spurs around by a 120-100 score at the Garden last night, and Larry Bird did not get a triple double. That's news.
Robert Parish, meanwhile, did play a sensational game, and while that isn't necessarily news, it's not often enough noted. Other centers can win games in their own manner, but nobody wins games the way Robert Parish does. Robert Parish is the starting center on the All-Sprinters Team.
"The first thing we said in the locker room before the game," said Spurs coach Cotton Fitzsimmons, "was that we know Robert is going to try to beat Artis (Gilmore) down the floor. It's not like we didn't think it was a serious matter."
It took exactly 25 seconds for the Spurs to realize how serious a matter it would be. San Antonio got the tap, and the ball went in to Artis, the Human Erector Set. He went right to what Bill Fitch would call his "basic," his pet move, his comfort-zone move. It is an involved dip-in move in which he uses about 713 fakes. Parish yawned his way through all of them, and when Artis finally launched the shot, Robert smashed the ball into his face. That was Part 1.
Part 2 followed immediately. Having rejected the Gilmore shot, Parish didn't stand around posing. He took off downcourt, receiving a nice feed from Dennis Johnson as soon as he hit the left lower box. He turned and laid the ball in, just as Artis was Dagwood Bumsteading his way into the play. You know what? It was 2-0, and the game was over.
If Parish weren't outrunning Gilmore vertically, he was out-quicking him horizontally. Parish looked like the All-Stater and Artis looked like the kid dragged off the high school corridor by the coach simply because he was the tallest man in school.
Anyway, the Celtics were making their first Garden appearance in three weeks, and they weren't about to disappoint the home crowd. It was 8-6, San Antonio, when Bird took a Danny Ainge feed for a cutting layup and Parish came rambling in from the right corner for a thunderous stuff. Kevin McHale (remember him?) threw in a runner, and DJ picked up a loose ball and laid it in to conclude an eight-point run, and you knew the Celtics were in control.
It was 32-23 after one quarter and 61-48 at the half. The second quarter was a kaleidoscope of downtown jumpers, mostly by the visitors, and drives, stuffs, outlets, behind-the-back passes, mostly by the Celtics. The big run in every way, both on the scoreboard and on the excitement meter, was a spurt of 17-6 which carried the Celtics from a 44-37 lead to a comfortable 61-43 advantage with 54 seconds remaining in the half.
During this burst, Parish (27 points, 10 rebounds, 3 blocks) outran the Spurs for three baskets, the best of which was the culmination of a sequence begun by a spectacular back-tap of an outlet by Bill Walton over to Bird, who hit a speeding Parish for a three-point drive. At moments such as this, the phrase "Greatest Show On Earth" springs to mind.
If the Spurs were harboring the remotest thought of an upset, said thought was blown away in the first 3:13 of the second half. With only an Alvin Robertson leaner and a Gilmore free throw intervening, the Celtics hit San Antonio with the following: a Bird layup, an Ainge 20-foot swish, a Johnson mortar, a Parish turnaround and a Johnson fast-break stop-and-popper. Now it was 71-51, and Fitzsimmons was beginning to think about playing time for some new arrivals.
"You hate to think this way," said the ever forthright Fitzsimmons, "but I tried to use this game as something to build on for the future."
As for Bird's failure to record another triple double, be assured that if either he or K.C. Jones was truly interested in stats, it would have been done. Bird had a 22-9-9 line and he only played 34 minutes.
Anyway, this was Chief's night. "When you play with the league MVP, a lot of people's contributions get overlooked," said Walton. "Robert Parish doesn't get the credit he deserves for the total player he is."
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