I'd like to thank the Washington Generals for travelling with the Celtics this past week.  It was especially nice of them to bring Chicago, Memphis, Philadelphia and Seattle uniforms with them.  That's a lot of packing.  Kudos to their equipment manager.

But after wins of 23, 30, 24 and last night 19 (it should have been more like 30)...  The Celtics will resume an NBA schedule.  Over the next 8 days... The Celtics will play 5 teams that are within 3 1/2 games of the top spot out West (with a Saturday raping of the Milwaukee Bucks also penciled in).  First up:  Utah on Friday... and then a Monday/Tuesday/Thursday jump into what Paul Pierce calls the "Texas Triangle" (San Antonio, Houston and Dallas).  And as I explained over at Red's Army... the Eastern Conference playoff seeds seem to be locked up... but the West is still very much up in the air.  That means those teams will be in full playoff mode when the C's swing by.  That, my friends (and even you douchebags), will be one hell of a challenge.

As for last night's game... I was sitting one row away for the festivities.  And by that I mean 1 row away from the top of the building.  Holy shit that was way up there.  But its a good view to take in the whole scene. Some notes: 

- I'm completely unimpressed with Kevin Durant.  His 16 points on 7-14 shooting is one of the most deceiving stat lines I've ever seen.  He did NOTHING without the ball.  I'm not making any judgement on his future or anything... I know its way too early for that.  I'm just pointing out that his performance on paper looks a LOT better than it actually was on the court.

- Sam Cassell made his home debut to a standing ovation.

- KG hit 7 of 14 shots.  As my buddy Ken pointed out.... most of his 7 makes were when he caught the ball and stepped into the shot.  Most of his 7 misses were on some sort of fadeaway.  If you notice his play recently, he's stepping into a lot of shots around the top of the key... and hitting most of them.  Ken also noticed that Rajon Rondo is doing a very good job of giving KG the ball a little ahead of him... giving the natural motion of stepping into his shot. 

- Ray Allen is on a fucking tear.  He hit 8 of 10 shots last night. He was 8-12 against Philly and 9-13 against Memphis.  That's 77% shooting over 3 games. 

- Paul Pierce seemed to concentrate on 1 stat at a time.  He came out with 14 points in the first quarter... and didn't score again because then he decided to start passing.  He finished with 11 assists.  If this game was closer... I feel like he would have asked to play center so he could get 5 more rebounds to complete the triple double.

-  When the game was essentially over and the "Gino" video played on the jumbotron during a time out... KG and Pierce spent the duration laughing their asses off at not only Gino... but at all the morons dancing for the cameras.  There was one guy in an argyle sweater doing the "white man's overbite" that almost knocked them over they were laughing so hard.  Doc Rivers could have been proving the existence of God in the huddle... but those guys were having a blast watching the screen.

- The best news as the C's get ready for a tough stretch:  James Posey led the team in minutes last night with 26:24.  They'll be fresh for Friday nights game.

John - RedsArmy.com