Allens Combine for 40 in W

November 10, 2008

AUBURN HILLS, Mich. - Last night's game was being billed around here as an early look at what could again be the Eastern Conference finals matchup. Well, the Pistons had better hope not.

The Celtics lived up to their championship rings, beating host Detroit, 88-76. The C's led by as many as 23 before the Pistons put some deodorant on the blowout with some late meaningless hoops.
Certainly they're still trying to assimilate Allen Iverson into their mix, but that doesn't fully explain the disparity between these clubs last night. The crowd was duly pumped for Iverson's first home game, but by halftime the Palace throng was wishing Joe Dumars had traded the rest of the Pistons with Chauncey Billups. Many of them chose to deal with the snow flurries outside rather than watch this abuse.



``Don't put this on the trade with Allen,'' Detroit coach Michael Curry said. ``This is a team that gets up into you. Boston is a really good defensive team.'' Tony Allen led the Celts with 23 points off the bench, and Ray Allen scored 17. But with Kevin Garnett scoring eight points and Paul Pierce adding just seven, the C's made their statement at the other end of the court, holding the hosts to 34.7 percent shooting.

``It was terrific,'' coach Doc Rivers said. ``Best defense of the year for us by far. Active hands, physical, got up into bodies - it was really neat to see. It was nice.'' Garnett said the defense saved the Celts after an opening quarter in which they scored 17 points on 23.8 percent shooting. `We look forward to playing Detroit,'' Garnett said. ``This is one of the teams we pattern ourselves after.''

The Celtics were simply stifling in the second quarter, holding Detroit without a made field goal for the last 7:33. The Pistons missed their last 10 shots and turned the ball over five times, making 4-of-8 free throws. They shot 18.8 percent from the floor in the frame.

Using their defense as a catapult, the Celts scored 30 points in that session, taking an 18-point lead and producing more in a quarter than Detroit had in the entire half (29). And they did it with Pierce pinned to the pine after picking up his third foul on a tough call.

``Coach said basically just attack when there's a lane, and I did that,'' Tony Allen (12 second-quarter points) said. ``We came out a little slow as a team, but once we got it together we came hard.''
Said Rivers: ``TA was tremendous, and we needed him. Paul gets the phantom third foul, so he has to sit the entire (second quarter), and we needed (Allen's) help.''

While Iverson (10 points) was still a bit tentative with his new mates, seemingly unwilling to fly solo even when they needed him to, it was the lack of offense from others that stopped the Pistons.
Rasheed Wallace had 10 points on 4-of-17 shooting, missing his first eight from the floor before scoring on a dunk 4:17 into the third period. And Richard Hamilton went 0-for-8 for the evening, getting all three of his points from the line.

It didn't help the Detroit cause that Rodney Stuckey was unavailable for the second half. According to the club, the second-year guard experienced symptoms of dizziness and felt lightheaded at the end of the first half. He remained on the bench and medical personnel were seen taking his pulse. Stuckey eventually went to the dressing room, and was held out thereafter.
The Pistons were held out of their offense pretty much all night.