Sports Redux: Knicks Help Celtics Beat Pistons

Where do you go after suffering what might be the worst loss in franchise history? (Hyperbole? How many other 5-52 teams have the Celtics ever lost to?) Do you give up on basketball? Walk the Earth like David Carradine and Jules Winnfield?

Or do you reach into the Knicks' playbook for some inspiration?

Doc Rivers wanted Nate Robinson to feel comfortable with the C's, so he spent the last couple of days, not reeling and retching like so many of the rest of us, but working some Knicks offense into the Celtics' practice routine. Said Doc, "My thought was that if we give him one of his plays, the other four won't be comfortable, but he will be." And it worked, as Nate hit three threes down the stretch as part of his 14, which the C's desperately needed to hold off Detroit 105-100.

Nate thought his new teammates adapted better to NY's style than...well, than NY did. "They liked the offense we showed them and we're trying to run it. I know when I'm in, I'll call that 99.9 percent of the time. I'll be real comfortable." Nate's play helped redeem the bench, which also got contributions from Big Baby (12 pts) and Shelden Williams (6 pts, 4 rebounds, and congratulations for doing whatever it was he did to get Doc to remember he exists).

Meanwhile, back home, the Bruins got back to work after the break, taking everyone's sudden reignited interest in hockey and squandering it in a listless 4-1 loss to Montreal. Without getting into excrutiating detail, we'll just turn it over to Coach Julien: "When you go into the third period with a 1-0 lead, you expect your team to not give up four, counting the empty net." Truer words have rarely been spoken.

The Red Sox sort of start their spring schedule today, with a pair of games against local college teams relaxing in Florida while we desperately wait up here for a sunny 40-degree day. The Sox play Northeastern in the afternoon and BC this evening, with a lot lot lot of pitchers and guys in their lineup you won't know. But, hell, it's baseball, and that's enough. On the Shaughnessy front, Dan apparently just learned that new Sox 3B Adrian Beltre suffered a terrible injury last year and so writes a delightfully saucy column (read: YAWN) about it. We're sure Beltre was thrilled to take these questions from Dan.