Parish (30 & 16) Leads Celtics over Bulls

February 1, 1983

PARISH COLLARS BULLS, 110-104

When you play in your home away from home you've got to be tough. Just ask Al Davis and the Oakland/Los Angeles Raiders, or Bill Fitch and the Boston/Hartford Celtics.



Once again commuting to this city of file cabinets and insurance companies, the Celtics played great team defense down the stretch last night, and ground out a 110-104 victory over the Chicago Bulls.

Robert Parish (30 points, 16 rebounds) had yet another in his long line of sensational games, and Larry Bird contributed 27 points, but both agreed that the Celts beat the Bulls by playing tough team defense in the final two minutes.

"When we go into the last quarter, we try to win with our defense," said Bird. "When we can't win with our offense, we try to win with something else."

"We felt like it was about time," concurred Parish. "We started putting pressure on their outside passes because they were hurting us with inside passes."

After a foul-line jumper by Quintin Dailey tied it (100-100) with 1:55 left, the Celtics were able to shut down the Bulls. That's no small feat when you remember that Reggie (the Solid-Gold Dancer) Theus scored 46 in Boston in December and center Dave Corzine has been a combination of Dolph Schayes, George Mikan and Bob Lanier against the Celtics (back-to-back 30-point games).

With 1:39 left, Parish tapped in a Gerald Henderson miss to put the Celtics ahead (102-100) for good. Dailey and Corzine both missed shots at the other end and Parish grabbed the rebound after Corzine's miss. Back on offense, Bird scored on a dazzling runner to make it 104-100 with one minute left. When the Bulls came back down, Parish and Bird combined to steal a Dailey pass.

An instant later, Theus (17 points) stole Bird's pass and went in for a layup to cut it to two. With 26 seconds remaining, M. L. Carr was fouled. He made both and it was 106-102. The Bulls called time. After the timeout, Chicago was tagged with a five-second violation when Rod Higgens couldn't find an open man to pass to at midcourt. One second later, Parish was fouled and sank both to make it 108-102. Then Bird deflected another pass and the Celtics had the ball with 21 seconds left. Henderson wasfouled and made both.

"We've always been tough down the stretch," said Fitch. "That's how you win close ball games. I think we forced four turnovers in the last few minutes. We've been doing it for four years. It's typical of the way we've played. That's just the nature of our basketball team."

The game opened with an 11-2 Celtic surge and it looked like the Celtics were finally on their way to Blowout City. Then Corzine got started. When the period was over the Bulls led, 32-27, and thoughts of Detroit's 123-116 Hartford victory (Nov. 30) came to mind.

The Celtics held Chicago to one offensive rebound in the second quarter and outscoed Paul Westhead's gunners, 27-22, to make it 54-all at the half.

Theus shot the Bulls to a 69-64 lead in the third quarter before Fitch called time with 5:25 left. From there, the Celtics went with a lineup of Bird, Parish, Kevin McHale, Tiny Archibald and Charles Bradley. (Bradley, incidentally, spent the next four minutes guarding his older brother, Dudley.) That quintet blasted the Bulls, 20-8, for the rest of the quarter and the Celtics were up, 84-77.

The Bulls, a 5-19 road team, wouldn't quit. Corzine and Dailey got going and Chicago outscored the Celtics, 13-2, at the start of the fourth quarter to take a 90-86 lead.

For Chicago, it was a chance to take advantage of the tired (six games in eight days) Celtics and the relative tranquility of the Hartford Civic Center. Most of the night, the "home" crowd of 12,742 responded as if it was at a narration of "Leaves of Grass." They were polite and attentive, but not like the raucous 15,320 in Boston Garden. When it got tight at the end, the crowd finally responded and so did the Celtics, who have won four straight and 14 of their last 16.