The Turnaround to Glory

It’s truly funny how cliché sayings can come back and remain cliché sayings.

“Can’t judge a book by its cover” was uttered when some thought that first Harry Potter book was probably too much for kids (and too childish and nascent for adults). “My enemy is your enemy,” is the logic that Henry Kissinger used when he was the Secretary of State (and not one of Richard Nixon’s cronies when domestic matters came to haunt him). And “Slow and steady wins the race,” is somehow relatable to NASCAR racing. And if you’re skeptical, ask Dale Earnhardt Jr., and he’ll convince you.

All of those timeless quotes or aphorisms are forever etched in our heads because we won’t ever take them out of our heads. “What a difference a year can make” is certainly in the heads right now of Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce, and Ray Allen.

It’s certainly resonates in Rajun Rando’s and Kendrick Perkins’ cerebral. It’s traveling through the nervous systems of James Posey and Sam Cassell, who have tasted this ultimate feeling of success. Leon Powe, Eddie House, Glen “Big Daddy” Davis, Tony Allen (who was rehabbing a torn ACL), P.J. Brown (semi-retired until he got the call in the second half of the season to join the ride), and the ones who never got off the bench in the post season, Brian Scalabrine and Scott Pollard, they surly weren’t in the same mental state now as they were 12 months ago.

Danny Ainge was considered a failure and unlucky as a General Manger, and Doc Rivers, despite some good years coaching in Orlando, was no better to some than Isaiah Thomas.

24 wins, in the shadows of the Red Sox and the Patriots, the Boston Celtics, their team, their staff, and their (loyal, not bandwagoning) fans can truly attest to the sayings “what a difference a year can make.”

Though the moves were made last June, the tone had to be officially set. All the talk of the new Big Three and a commitment to the defensive end was all good and well to revitalize the franchise, but it had to be proven on the court. On the first night in November, that tone was set alright.

The Washington Wizards were the first to see up close what everybody else would see: a devastating balance offensive attack and an impervious force on the other side of the ball that evoked memories of Bill Russell and company. Pierce had 28 points, Garnett had 22, 20 rebounds, and three blocks, Ray Allen pitched in 17 points and Rando dropped 15 points to go along with four steals. They harassed Gilbert Arenas to a five for 19 performance, and they won by a score line that would be indicative of their forthcoming dominance.

103-83.

They would finish November 13-2, including a foreshadowing 107-94 home victory against the Lakers. They would be more dominate in December, going 13-1,including another clairvoyant result against the same Purple and Gold team in Los Angeles this time, beating them 110-91 two days before the new year.

The new year that saw a change from the previous one.

Only the irrational would label them “stumbling to the finish”, when the Celtics had their first losing streak in February. A three game skid on the road against Denver, Golden State, and Phoenix that had everyone concerned, even if their record was still a robust 41-12, and begin ridiculous talks of them now coming back to the pack. They ended the regular season 66-16, seven games better than anyone else, nine games better than those Lakers. Still, the concerns were there that this 42 game turnaround would fall short.

And the signs were showing in the first round against the Atlanta Hawks, a series that should have had no business going the full distance. But for them to fulfill their destiny, it needed to be. Because every struggle that Joe Johnson gave his former team, every idiotic trash talking moment Al Hortford placed on Pierce, and every road game blown in the fourth quarter made this team realize how title worthy they were compared to the regular season. They realized what to do in a tight playoff game, the awkward moment in the dwindling stages down the stretch that tested this squad into making this year a total 360 from its predecessor.

They got through that near embarrassment, and dealt with LeBron James in the next road. A Cleveland Cavaliers team, who was last year’s Eastern Conference representative in the Finals (and the fourth lambs to the slaughter to the San Antonio Spurs), 21 games inferior to the Celtics pushing them to the brink for a second consecutive series. And did they ever push them to the precipice, more so than what the Detroit Pistons or the Lakers would do. But they needed to be pushed to the limit like that, because Pierce would have never had the moment where he was James equal that third Sunday afternoon on May. It would have never propelled him to take the level he did against the Detroit Pistons and the Lakers. And Rivers, his terrific staff of Tom Thibodeau, Armand Hill, and Kevin Eastman, the fans, and everyone else would have still wondered who would be the go to guy when the game was on the line in the waning moments.

The whispers of not being strong and steady enough for a 66 win team continued to be whispered in their ears after surviving Cleveland. A number of people had the Pistons, who have been in the latter stages of the playoffs in this millennium longer than Apple began their I-products market assault, dispatching them. The Celtics weren’t the same team that they were in the regular season some of the pundits felt. And when game two happened in that series, when almost everyone on the Pistons hit a three that you thought Jason Maxell knocked one from beyond the arc, you thought that the dream would be over for the Celtics right there.

They had lost at home for the first time in the playoffs, and the negative thoughts about Rivers, Garnett, Pierce, Allen (mired in the worst slump in his career), and Ainge not being big enough to win (in their current positions) a title crept back in to the public perception.

Then game three of that series happened. And ever since that night in Auburn Hills, a night that would be one of the two shining symbols of how this year wasn’t the same as last year for anyone representing the Boston Celtics, assurance in those figures to orchestrate a championship, to engineer a championship, and to garner a championship would never be in jeopardy. Garnett had 23 and 12 to go along with six assists that night. Perkins had a double-double of 12 and 10 that felt like a triple double. Posey, the man who Shaquille O’Neal says the Miami Heat would have never won the title two years ago without, chipped in 12 off the bench. And everybody on that team played the defense that night to turn that series around.

Just as they did with many prognosticators opinions, when these figures once again discounted their 66-win regular season and wanted to give Kobe Bryant his 4th title (and Phil Jackson’s 10th title to past Red Auerbach, they turned them upside down too. They did that with the second shining symbol of how destiny was on their side like those 16 other times the franchise was the last team standing. And how there was no question that they were the best team this season.

131-92.

That was the final score, a 39 point victory filled with dunks, threes, and uncontrollable rapture after the game. A Gatorade bath that you would only see at the Super Bowl, the emotion of relief and rejoice of a postgame celebration and a town spoiled with another title from one of their teams.

That final win originated from the first win, on the first night in November 2007. That 103-83 victory over the Wizards originating from a few moves made last June. Moves when the team was brutally unlucky to not be able to select Greg Odom or Kevin Durant. Moves that produced a cliché saying almost 365 days later.

“What a year a difference makes.”

For Garnett, Pierce, Allen, Rivers, Ainge, the rest of the team, the rest of the organization and the die-heart fans of this Boston Celtic franchise, there’s nothing cliché about it at all.