Boston at Washington
7:o0 P.M. EST.
Verizon Center
Local TV/Radio: CSN/WEEI
Offensive Efficiency:
Boston: 107.5 points/100 possessions (13th)
Wizards: 105.3 points/100 possessions (23rd)
Defensive Efficiency:
Boston: 101.7 points allowed/100 possessions (1st)
Wizards: 109.4 points allowed/100 possessions (23rd)
Probable WAS starters:
Mike Miller, Randy Foye, Brendan Haywood, Caron Butler, Antwan Jamison
Injury Suspension Report
Wizards: OUT: Gilbert Arenas, Javaris Crittenton (guns)
Thumbnail: The Celtics travel to Washington off of their most crushing loss of the year and try to salvage a win to cap off a brutal stretch of 4 games in 5 days.
Forgive me, but this preview will be a bit of a lightening round if you will for a couple reasons, most glaringly because I’m still cranky after last night’s loss and the 4 games in 5 nights has us working without a lot of juice in reserve. On that note, let’s go to the tape.
WHAT THE WIZARDS DO WELL:
* Offensive Rebound. It’s quite simple here really. Brendan Haywood is a top 3 offensive rebounder in the entire league. Antwan Jamison can be quite effective on the glass when he wants to be (11 offensive rebounds Saturday Night, against the Knicks but still!) Plus Andray Blatche provides above averaging rebounding ability coming off the bench. Put all of these factors together and you get a solid team when it comes to the offensive glass. Only 10th in the league overall in offensive rebounding percentage, but their top dogs are some of the best at it. The C’s did a good job keeping the Lakers off the offensive glass most of last night, and they will need a repeat performance this evening.
WHAT THE WIZARDS DO POORLY:
* Defend the Perimeter. They won’t run you off the 3 point line (28th in league) and they also don’t force many turnovers out there either (24th in league). As a matter of fact, they are in the bottom half of the league in all 4 defensive factors so we might as well generalize here and confirm the well known fact that this team does not play much defense at all.
* Shoot from the Field. Somewhat of a shocker to me that what many consider to be a team with so many offensive weapons is 23rd in the league in FG Percentage. I guess that explains a lot more about their pathetic record
PLAYER/S WHO MAKE ME WORRY:
* Brendan Haywood. That whole rebounding thing I mentioned earlier, but the guy, like Perk is an efficent scorer down low. Luckily for us, the C’s have Perk but he needs to ensure he stays out of foul trouble.
* Anyone else in the starting lineup not named Randy Foye
Really hard to pick one person here, since we have 3 offensive minded players capable of exploding for 30 points in any game. The C’s will be short on energy tonight, but need to bring a similar defensive effort this evening to Washington to keep the Jamison/Butler/Miller trio from taking off.
PLAYER/S WHO DO NOT MAKE ME WORRY:
* Randy Foye
He’s been playing fairly well in his last 10 games, but is the least of the C’s offensive worries tonight. Rondo should do well to contain him.
WHAT WE WANT TO SEE FROM THE C’s TONIGHT:
* A Win.
* A Strong Defensive Effort
* Execution Down The Stretch
* Rajon Rondo attacking in the 4th quarter
* Not crawling into a shell when the team has a lead in crunch time
* I’m gonna stop there before I get more bitter than I should.
PREDICTION: This one scares me. Theoritcally the C’s should come out hungry and take care of the Wiz early to put an end to their losing streak. But when has anything gone to plan this year? Plus the Wiz have won 2 in a row. Ok so they beat the Knicks and Nets but a win is a win. They are the kind of time that is prone to giving the C’s problems when they lack legs, which is a high possibility this evening, even though Doc kept the minutes to a reasonable level last night. Ok enough blabbering, closer that it should be but the C’s pull away, and stop the bleeding for now C’s 108, Wizards 97.
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I know it’s probably easy to assume that DeShawn Stevenson was involved with guns in the locker room, but not this time. I think you want to replace his name with Javaris Crittenton on your suspended list.
Let’s all hope not to see Paul at the top of the key milking the clock in the 4th. Even if the Cs have a substantial lead, let’s hope they get the ball up quickly every possession & look for easy, high percentage shots. Let’s hope that there is not just 1 player having a dribbleathon, but that there are lots of passes & bodies moving. Let’s hope that if a starter is tired, moving slow, having a bad game that Doc will have the courage to play 1 or more bench players in the 4th.
Why a 3 pointer ……..
Wow, thanks for the catch. Kyle for the unintentional but very glaring error.
We won