Celtics (4-0) at Sixers (2-1) 11/3

[QuinielaBox]

The Sixers are coming off 2 straight wins - Home against Milw and a high scoring OT win in New York.

I agree that the PG matchup is very important tonight.

Not mentioned above was the bench play which could be a problem when Marreese Spieghts enters the game. The Sixers will get a rebounding advantage when Marreese Spieghts and Elton Brand are used together against KG and Rasheed Wallace. To counter that Perkins will have to carry more of the load along with Sheldon Williams.

Philly wants to run and score a lot. Boston wants to maintain a half court pace and keep the game in double digits. Both teams are rested so energy should not be a problem. Conventional wisdom says the team that controls the boards controls the pace so rebounding is in my opinion the key to the game.

Boston will want to take control of the game early and make Philly play up hill in the 2nd half. Philly's worst qtrs are the 2nd and 3rd so a balanced C's effort should get the job done here.

Take Boston to cover and play the under line.

Looks like I was accurate on all counts except for Mareese Spieghts having a matchup advantage. The Celtics played very well tonight save for the 1st 8 minutes of the game. Rasheed Wallace, Eddie House, Sheldon Williams, along with Marquis Daniels were stellar. Philly is not a horrible basketball team, they just did not have the horses to keep up with the Green Machine Juggernaut. Imagine if KG had a good game. 

How dominent was Boston? - They led by over 15 pts over the final 18 minutes. The bench was the difference according to the +/- stats in the box score. Also the FG% differential was staggering and the adjusted FG% differential was off the charts.

[jdpapa3]

You know, in a year or two Lester Hudson might just be a real honest to goodness backup point guard in this league.

I was thinking he could be right now or by the end of the season. Are you telling me he's not better than Toney Douglas of the Knicks? I bet Hudson would be getting 15-18 minutes on the Knicks or some of those other teams out there.

[nickagneta]

You know, in a year or two Lester Hudson might just be a real honest to goodness backup point guard in this league.

I was thinking he could be right now or by the end of the season. Are you telling me he's not better than Toney Douglas of the Knicks? I bet Hudson would be getting 15-18 minutes on the Knicks or some of those other teams out there.

Well, let's not go nuts because he is playing with a second unit that in garbage time consists of Rasheed Wallace, Eddie House and Marquis Daniels. When you are a second teamer who's in the 11th or 12th slot on a team and yet in garbage time get to play with the quality of players that Hudson does, it makes you look a lot better than you might be.

That said, the kid's quick and strong, he definitely has range, he gets the defense and offense mentally and doesn't seem to be over thinking or over pressing the game. He definitely lets the game come to him, which shows a pretty high BBIQ, IMHO. He has not made any spectacular plays but I haven't seen dumb plays yet either and for a 58th pick in the draft, that is extremely impressive.

I want to see what he could do if pressed into real meaningful minutes in an emergency before I would crown him being able to be a real reliable NBA PG, but, [dang], it looks like I was wrong as hell on this guy. In a year or two, if he shows consistent growth, he could be a steal where the C's picked him up.

[ACF]

A TP for this one as well. How nice to get a W for my b-day 

[Drucci]

Great game! Slow start (and even putrid start should I say) but man... our bench is just AWESOME! 62 points in the game, Sheed getting crazy beyond the 3 points line... Pierce had a great game but it's really cool to see that even when KG and Ray don't get more than 10 points together, we can still blowout the opponent.

Great rest for the starters. Loved what I've seen from Marquis (great offensive moves, he's good on one on one), Lester, and Shelden (nice jumpshot... or at least falling last night). 5-0 and and Orlando loss, we take a little advantage for the 1st seed!

And Happy Birthday ACF!