nerditry

By Evan D

The Beast vs. the Least. The team that locked up their conference long before anyone else was thinking about seeding. It’s a study of the differences between two franchises on a similar track to end the 2006/07 campaign and how they’ve both turned the corner, but onto different sides of the street.

Let’s cliché : Defense…wins championships and no one comes remotely close to the team defense Boston has played this season. The Celtics have held opponents to just 96.1 points per 100 possessions, a full three points better than second and third place Houston and San Antonio who are known for stifling defenses. Consider that the team they are likely to face (Lakers) give up 102.8 while scoring 110.3, a difference of about 7.5 while Boston’s own differential is a staggering 11.5. Atlanta barely sniffs this type of efficiency and consistency with a negative differential of about -1.8, meaning that they play and lose a lot of close games.

Boston doesn’t often let teams hang around with them and looks to set the tone very early, getting buckets from every starter on their offense. Garnett has given his stats a vacation this year, looking for his teammates first and playing the garbage man to get all of the little things completed. Instead, Pierce and Allen have a better player than them (first time) looking to feed them on every possession, meaning Rondo is able to move through defensive and look for setup points and Kendrick Perkins often finds himself on the end of a hand-off or dump pass around the basket. I dare say that Boston’s bench doesn’t contain a lot of players the Hawks would have in prominent roles. The second line has Cassell (scorer) and House (chucker) at guards, a second defensive stopper in Posey and Big Baby/Powe up front, with both looking for rebounds and use of 6 fouls. It then, seems inevitable that Boston is going to run through these guys, but Atlanta possesses the intangibles to Boston’s stat machine.

Youth! Boston is the equivalent of Ocean’s 11 if they brought back Sinatra and the original cast a few years ago. For every few positives, there is a nag in the back of one’s mind that Ray and Sam specifically are playing on borrowed time and on shaky wheels. I feel good that Atlanta is going to get and will have to create opportunities to push the ball and force scenarios. Bibby is slower than snot in comparison to Rondo, but has a legit two inches and many lbs to force the ball lower into a half-court set. Joe Johnson should be posting Ray Allen up all game long and looking to spread the floor to get one of his bigs open near the basket. It’s going to take a team effort from the Hawks under the basket because Garnett and Pierce do well to pickup rebounds that Perkins doesn’t. Marvin Williams and Josh Smith spend too much time away from the basket when Horford is not established as dominant in the post and will have to focus on offensive rebounds to keep the game in check. Childress, Pachulia and Stoudamire will round out what could be a very short bench and I’d like to see the Hawks try to use this to their advantage. Subbing in more often to keep players fresh and making an issue out of pressing on defense and pushing quickly on offense, in a similar fashion to the Suns.

Prediction : The Celtics win the series in a 4-0 sweep and Atlanta really has a shot at taking one game at home if the lethargic Atlantans break 10,000 attendance and Boston’s bus gets lost.

Rebuttal : Fraser MacK
Of all the series, this is the one most likely to end in a sweep. You’ve got Boston, a team on a mission to bring the glory back to the Garden (I refuse to call the arena the Celtics’ play in anything but the Garden) and then, Atlanta, making it’s first trip to the playoffs since the last planetary alignment. Let’s get one thing straight, Boston is worse than their record and Atlanta is better than their record. Boston won a lot of games early because everyone on the Celtics was playing at 150% just to keep Garnett off their asses and everyone on the other team was too busy watching in awe as the media heaped Big Baby sized praise onto the new Big Three on a daily basis. That was a long sentence, but here’s an easier way to say this: Boston will win, but this series will mean more to Atlanta and their young roster. Sort of like the Magic last year, this team needs a little taste of the playoffs before they retool for next year, hopefully with a new coach and GM.