Sports Redux: TSOP (The Strangulation of Philadelphia)

Superficially, it looked like the old rivalry again. The Sixers have brought back the old logo, the old floor from the Spectrum (more or less) and uniforms that hearken back to the days of Dr. J and Andrew Toney. But the team that Philly put on the floor last night was no match for the early 09-10 Celtics. The '83 Sixers might not have been.

The C's did what they do, overcoming a shaky offensive night by putting Philly in the Iron Clamps of Shooting Doom, holding them to 36.3% from the floor and an earth-shattering 1-of-16 from the three-point line (and that one was in the garbagiest of garbage time). Sixers coach Eddie Jordan: "I would say in that outside of the first 6 minutes, when I thought we played really, really well, it was certainly a stinker."

The defense covered up some really lame offensive performances: KG scored 3, Ray Allen 5. Making up for that was Paul Pierce (21), and the long-range gunnery of Rasheed Wallace and Eddie House, a combined 10-of-13 from long range. Sheed was extra motivated to be playing in his hometown: "A lot of friends and family don't get the opportunity to see me play. Everybody can't get that league pass and all that stuff." He even got himself his first Celtic technical for old time's sake. The C's go on to Minnesota to visit Garnett's old friends and our own old friends Al Jefferson and Ryan Gomes tonight.

The Bruins finally broke their win-one/lose-one streak that's lasted the whole season, but unfortunately, they did it by losing their second straight. Specifically, they got shut out for the second straight game and lost 2-0 to the Red Wings. Coach Claude Julien moped afterwards, "We're going to have to decide that we're tired of hearing we had a good effort without winning." In Toronto, Phil Kessel made his Maple Leafs debut, and fortunately for the psyche of Bruins fans everywhere, he didn't score either.

Pedro Martinez is all that stands between the Yankees and the World Championship tonight. So Dan Shaughnessy makes nice and tries to pretend that the Boston sports media was with him all the way. As we consider ourselves part of the Boston sports media, we'd like to disavow basically everything Shank says, ever.