Eastern Conference Finals
1981-82 Boston Celtics
The message was written in letter form to the good folk of Philadelphia, Pa.
There seemed to be only one typewriter in the Garden last night, so each of the Celtics took a turn on the keys. The big men banged and clanged the machine hard, one after another, writing their words in the midst of a steamy 114-85 win over the Philadelphia 76ers to stay alive and keep all playoff possibilities open.
The text follows:
Dear Good Folk of Philadelphia,
Hello again. How are you? We are fine.
It only has been three days since we visited your fair city - you know, we never did see the Liberty Bell, after all - and things have changed a bit. Remember how we seemed to be dragging a bit, how those fuzzy Spectrum mascots were laughing at us, how the guy was pouring the beer on us as we left the door? Remember? All better.
There were people who were saying that we were ready to deflate the old basketballs, send the rafter flags out for their spring cleaning, but we never believed that. Did you? Didn't think so. You've seen this act before, too. You knew, probably better than anyone, that we wouldn't be done that quickly and easily.
No, what we needed, more than anything was a little time. Remember how Tiny Archibald fell down and hurt himself in the first of those two weekend games? We needed just a little time to go back to the old practice court, think a bit, fine tune the fine tuner all of that. See how it worked?
Take it, Gerald Henderson:
"We just had to get a game plan. I had to know what we were going to run. Once we had a game plan, I didn't have to look over to (coach) Bill Fitch every time to see what the play would be. I just called it. That we were able to move the ball up the floor faster. Philadelphia wasn't able to set up as well."
See how easy it was? Those Sixers were sending all kinds of extra help into the middle to stop our center, Robert Parish. Doing a pretty good job of it, too. Moving the ball up the floor faster kept them from doing it. Robert was able to get the ball and work.
See how fast it paid off? The big fellow was 7 for 8, 15 points by the end of the first quarter. Easy. That jumper started going through the hoop and Judy Garland never saw a more beautiful rainbow. Her dog, Toto, neither.
Take it, Kevin McHale:
"I went to Robert's house for dinner this afternoon. His lady made chicken and cauliflower. I've never had that before in my life, but if we play back here again, you know where I'm going to eat and what I'm going to eat. Robert was terrific.
"People have been asking a lot of questions about him in the past two games, but who can explain how things go in this game? Like the weather, everything comes and goes. Nolan Ryan pitches a no-hitter, then gets shelled the next game and everyone asks what happened. Comes and goes."
You saw, though, how everything came this time, didn't you? It was as if all the lost pieces of our game fell back into synch. We looked the same way we looked in the first game when everyone was accusing us of running up the score. (Oh, sorry, we had promised not to mention the first game. Because it meant nothing.)
Anyway, Robert started cranking. Then Larry Bird started hitting those long jumpers again. Did you notice that? The rhythm returned and those suckers were flying. See the one where he dribbled between his legs, then threw up a 25-foot swisher? That's Larry.
Maybe you saw, too, that Gerald had his act working again. Looked sure of himself. Danny Ainge, too. He looked fast instead of frail this time. Looked all right. Then there were the big people on the boards, just collecting those rebounds for the nice layups. And all that kung-fu defense, everyone stepping out to help everyone else. And the passing. Maybe you saw the extra pass. The familiar Celtics pass. That was good, too.
Take it, Rick Robey:
"We'd just been holding the ball too long on the baseline. Just waiting for the good pass. We reacted. We made the pass tonight, got it to Robert and when he's got the ball alone with someone, he's something to see."
If there is a familiarity to this letter, than let us apologize. We know we wrote much of the same stuff last year - you probably remember the quote about We had to just win one in Philadelphia to win the thing, and we still have to win just one" after this same fifth game - but what can we say? This is the same situation.
At least we're not writing all that stuff about the possibility of Wilt choking' again. We've improved since those days. Gerald Henderson, for example, hasn't been seen trying to fight Darryl Dawkins with a folding chair. Nobody was lighting a cigar at the end of this one. Nobody was even making a big deal of "Celtics Pride" and the leprechaun on the Garden rim.
No, we just won a game to stay alive and, as Henderson said, to put on our right face.' You good folk from Philadelphia can just look at the situation and make of it what you will. If you see similarities between other years and other times, well, that's your problem. Sleep with an Andrew Toney night light, if you will, to try to keep the demons away.
McHale said our situation is Still in the coffin, the lid open, but now we have a leg out.' We'd just like to get the other leg out, too. A lot of voices would like us to close with something snappy, like SEE YOU SUNDAY,' but we're not going to force the issue that hard. We'll let you decide if that's in the realm of possibility.
We'll just say -
See you, Friday
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