Bird Continues to Thrive Coming Off Bench as C's Win 9th in a Row

Celtics Improve to 46-15
1981-82 Boston Celtics

Let us praise the great Sixth Men, those valued subs who, but for the skill and dexterity of the great players around them, would be starting for some other team. You know them well. Ernie Vandeweghe . . . Frank Ramsey . . . John Havlicek . . . Billy Cunningham . . . Junior Bridgeman . . . Larry Bird.

Larry Bird?

It promises to be fun while it lasts. The best player in basketball inaugurated a new career last night, coming off the bench for the first time since his junior year at Spring Valley High School to ignite the crowd and help insure the Celtics' ninth straight win, a 121-100 triumph over the Indiana Pacers. And when you turn on your telly tomorrow night as the Celtics play the Nets, you'll see him coming off the bench again.

"We'll ride this thing out a while," said Bill Fitch afterward. "It would be easy to start him right away, but it's not a bad idea to give him this experience. He's a guy who doesn't like to sit, for any reason.

"There are times in ball games when he may have to sit with fouls or whatever, and he's not used to coming off the bench that way. This is a good experience. You can say I'm getting him ready for his 20th year in the league."

About all the Pacers wonder is why they had to be on the schedule the night Bird made his comeback. After an out-of-focus five-minute first half stint, Bird returned in the second half to compile a 20-point (10-for-11), 7- rebound, 3-assist second-half stat line in just 14 minutes.

He connected on all seven third-quarter field goal attempts (a lane runner, a dunk, a lefty tapin and four jumpers of 15 to 21 feet), scoring 14 points in a span of just over six minutes as the Celtics, who were never really troubled in the final 41 minutes, stretched their lead to 18 points (87-69) with 2:15 remaining in the quarter. And to say that Bird accomplished his feat with a dramatic flair is to say that Henny Youngman knows his way around a one-liner.

"In the first half," explained Bird, "I really wasn't moving or into the game yet. In the second half, I started to get my confidence back."

Bird favored the nightly capacity crowd of 15,320 with a good portion of his act in the entertaining third quarter. The banked runner and two jumpers helped him attain his rhythm, and with the score 79-67, he really picked up his personal tempo.

He began with a 20-footer. Next came a tough traffic rebound and fast- break outlet, culminating in a trailer dunk on a nice feed from Cedric Maxwell. An even tougher traffic rebound started another fast break, and when M.L. Carr missed a bit of baseline dipsy-doo, Bird flashed in for a sensational left-handed tap-in.

An 18-footer from the left at the 2:15 mark completed a personal run of eight points and three rebounds in the span of 1:19.

It must be pointed out that Bird was the icing, that his teammates had demonstrated superiority ever since the visitors from the five-minute mark of the first period. The truth is that the starting five of Robert Parish (21 points, 14 rebounds), Kevin McHale, Maxwell (a fifth straight 20-point game), Gerry Henderson and Carr has achieved a form of basketball symbiosis. "That five is playing as if they've been together for four years," marveled Fitch.

Indiana coach Jack McKinney had constructed a defense predicated on stopping Boston's inside game. But Carr and Henderson shot over it immediately. Even Maxwell hit two outside shots. But the key to a 36-point first quarter (highlighted by a 13-2 run that broke open a 19-18 game) was Boston's ability to improvise.

The Celtics have devised a beautiful inside-out passing game, for one thing, and when people react to the threat of Henderson's medium-range shooting, he can burn them with his passing, as on one gorgeous mid-air foul line dishoff for a Maxwell layup.

The Celtics led by at least a dozen at every checkpoint; be assured that they were in complete control. "We were outplayed by a better team who beat us in an awful lot of ways," sighed McKinney. "We could have played super tonight and still lost to that team."

The Celtics are glad to know that Bird won't foul up their team, anyway. "Bird?" inquired McHale. "He's not a bad sixth man."