8.24.2010

Larry v. Magic: Game 12 (Part 11)

1984 NBA Finals Game 5

Larry v. Magic: Game-by-Game Summary

Larry v. Magic: Game-by-Game Media Coverage

EYES OF THE TIGERS

The story was written in the eyes. The other parts of the body will get all the notice because they were used to score the baskets and grab the rebounds and slap away passes, but the Boston Celtics' eyes told you everything you had to know.

Through the steam, through the heat, through the forced march that was the fifth game of this NBA playoff series last night, the eyes never blinked. The eyes. The eyes. The eyes.

"Come on," the eyes said to the Los Angeles Lakers. "Let's see what you have now. Come on."

It was as if the Celtics had ordered up all the climactic conditions from room service. All the leg-buckling heat. All the inflated series pressure. All the wall-to-wall Garden noise. They were the old Green Bay Packers, the Packers of Vince Lombardi, bringing the opposition into an inverted version of Lambeau Stadium on a December afternoon. They were determined to make the night a test of manhood as much as basketball.

"How do you like it?" the Celtics' eyes said all night long. "How long can you last? Heat? What heat? We don't feel any heat? Let's play a little bit more basketball."

In every aspect of the 121-103 dismantling of the houseguests from Los Angeles, the Celtics were stronger, tougher, more forceful. That was their goal from the beginning. Take the game. Force and more force. Keep moving until someone dropped, wilted or went dizzy.

"Keep it going, keep it going, keep it going," M.L. Carr shouted at every timeout, bolting from the bench. "Keep it going."

From Larry Bird to Robert Parish to Greg Kite and Carlos Clark, there was a high school, pound-em-into-the-ground enthusiasm that seldom is seen in the work-a-day professional game. There was Carr, with his 59 cents fan, cooling off the troops during each rest. There was Quinn Buckner, helping with a towel. There was Parish, buckling twice with leg cramps, wobbling off the court from the exertion of what he was doing.

Uh, and there was Larry.

He has had fatter, larger, more glossy games inside a Celtics uniform, but he never has had a more determined one. Eyes? He had headlights on this night. He had fairy-tale saucers. He had eyes that could see through buildings, cornfields, all across America and deep into the scariest part of Dancing Barry's silver soul.

How good was Larry Bird's night? He hit 15 of 20 shots - two of them three-pointers. He had 17 rebounds, 10 more than Kareem Abdul-Jabbar even saw. Better than all of that, though, Larry Bird had 42 minutes on the floor, his body turning the color of a well-done Jimmy's Harborside lobster before he finished.

"Larry sets goals that are unreAchable for the rest of us," Carr said about Larry's night. "Then he reaches them."

Every time the Celtics seemed as if they would falter, there was Bird. Hitting the three-pointer. Taking the ball inside and spinning, turning, cutting through the bodies in front of him. Woofing down another rebound, nobody else mattering. Sliding through the maze in front of the basket, just knocking the ball away.

There were a half-dozen Larry Bird plays to cut out and discuss, but here are two of them. Clips from the reel.

No. 1. Remember the dunk by the Lakers' James Worthy in the last game? Remember how Worthy spun past Bird, went underneath the basket and came around with a large arm to blast the ball through the rim. Remember that? Larry Bird remembered.

In the third period, James Worthy took the same polar route toward the basket. Not around Bird this time, but someone else. Bird was a half-step away. Worthy came around and was nine-tenths of the way into his stop-the- clock slam. Oh-oh. The ball did not go through the basket. Larry Bird's hand was waiting to deflect the shot away.

"Fool me once, shame on you," Larry Bird's hand said. "Fool me twice, shame on me."

No. 2. The game was won now in the fourth period. There was a need for a topping.

When the Lakers rattled and clattered to their two big-score wins in this series, they always had some sort of a show-biz, dunkathon finish. Bird had one for this game.

Alone at the top of the keey with Worthy, he faked the jump shot once, faked twice. Worthy edged in just the direction of the fake. Larry Bird took off, thumping through the middle of the lane, this slow man that shouldn't be able to do these things, going past Worthy and making the lay-up and adding the foul. The points made the score, 114-95 and were the end of Larry's night.

"This series is going to be like the Marathon," Celtics forward Cedric Maxwell had said after the third game, Boston trailing, 2-1. "The Lakers are going to hit the wall and we're going to catch them going into Copley Place. Here come the Celtics!"

Larry was in the lead - those eyes straight ahead - but the rest of team was with him. How about Robert Parish? Forty-one minutes. Outplaying Abdul- Jabbar. Grabbing the rebounds. Playing until he dropped. How about Dennis Johnson, stuck to Magic Johnson all night, outscoring the Magic Man, 22-10. How about Kevin McHale and Maxwell, 29 points between them?

How about . . . how about all of the Celtics? How about the way they not only defused the Lakers, but by the middle of the second half even outran the lakers? How about the way they have changed this lopsided series to such a different dimension? How about . . .

How about them eyes?

2 comments:

Matty said...

delonte signed to a non guaranteed contract! what u reckon lex?

p.s lovin the Larry V Magic stuff!

Lex said...

Hey Matty,

I'm pretty excited about delonte.

No doubt he is another weapon.

Can he keep his head on straight?