Bird's Rookie Year: Celtics Close Game with 10-0 Run

January 3, 1980

HOUSTON

Ho-hum. Another night, another stirring Celtic road triumph. Another clutch performer. After all, why should this year be any different than the one before it?

The Celtics scored the last 10 points in the game after having blown a 12- point second-quarter lead and a nine-point third-quarter lead - and they did this after having fallen behind by seven points (95-88) with 6:42 remaining - to defeat the Houston Rockets, 111-103, last night. The Celtics rallied behind some superb team defense, some fantastic fourth-quarter play by Cedric Maxwell (who scored 12 of his game-high 29 points in the final 4:56) and some of the basic poise they have demonstrated on the road all season.

The defense played by the Celtics during the final three minutes was truly exceptional. Trailing, 103-101, they forced successive 24-second violations, followed by a wild Rick Barry three-point heave. And in a sweet homecoming touch, the basket which cemented the triumph was a 20-foot jumper by University of Houston grad Don Chaney, whose swisher with 17 seconds to play gave the Celts an insurmountable 109-103 lead. And the Duck even got to bang in the final nail with a press-beating layup at the buzzer.

A late Celtic flurry temporarily stilled a Rocket thrust which had reduced a one-time 12-point lead to one, and the Celtics left with a 61-54 halftime edge.

The Celtics had gone up, 37-25, with 9:59 remaining in the half, but they were only able to manage one field goal in the next 6:56 - a corner jumper by M.L. Carr at 7:47 - and the Rockets, a listless club in the first 15 minutes, sprang to life behind the underneath aggression of Moses Malone and the backcourt excitement of rookie Allan Leavell.

Malone re-entered the game at that minus-12 juncture after having suffered through a 1-for-8 first period. His presence seemed to inspire the Rockets to play harder than they had been doing, and before too long the steals and second-chance shots which formerly had been the exclusive property of the Celtics in this wild game suddenly had become the weapons of the home team.

A run of seven straight Houston points first reduced the deficit to five at 37-32, but the Celts boosted it back to nine on Carr's fast-break basket and a pair of Tiny Archibald fast-break free throws, two of his 15 first-half points (to go with eight assists and seven steals). But Houston kept plugging, until successive Boston turnovers led to fast-break baskets by Calvin Murphy and Leavell, the exceptionally quick guard out of Oklahoma City. At this point, Celtic coach Bill Fitch called a timeout, and shortly thereafter, Larry Bird, a curiously reluctant shooter in the first half (and an overpasser to the detriment of both himself and the team on occasion), rebounded a three- point miss of Chris Ford's for the first Boston basket in 4:43.

It was Bird who provided the Celtics with a little daylight, and some momentum of their own, when, with the score holding at 51-48, he deftly dribbled backward on a fast break and swished a three-pointer from the right flank at the 2:04 mark. Malone answered with a beautiful fake-right-and-spin- left move on Rick Robey (playing at the time because Dave Cowens had three personals). But Ford, the erstwhile Christopher Longshot, stuck in a three- pointer from the left on Boston's next possession for his first basket of the game, a shot which extended his amazing long-range streak to at least one three-pointer in 20 of his last 21 games.

The Celtics had a chance to go ahead by nine at the half when Robey made a nice lefty flip with 16 seconds to go, but Leavell beat Ford with three seconds left on a nice swooping drive to create the halftime score of 61-54.

That Boston only led by eight (29-21) at the end of one quarter was frustrating, because the Rockets had only connected on 9 of 32 first-period shots and had contributed nonexistent offense-to-defense transition on top of that miserable offense.