Sports: January 2009 Archives

The Celtics thought - and so did we - that going home would make everything OK. It didn't. The C's are officially in the doldrums, and even a return to the Garden couldn't break them out of their slump, as they lost a tight see-saw game to the Rockets, 89-85. The Celtics played very well at the beginning and then in spurts, but Houston, undermanned as they were (no Tracy McGrady or Shane Battier), kept plugging away, mostly on the inside presence of Yao Ming and......

Sometimes, there's a fair-to-lousy team that just has a good team's number. It happens. The Celtics saw it with the Wizards and Hawks last year. Even in the days of the lowly Devil Rays, they still rose up and beat the Sox and Yankees more than their share. So it's not usually the end of the world. But now a bunch of lousy teams have had the Celtics' number in the last couple of weeks, and we're troubled. The defending champs flew out to the West Coast kings of the world, and come to the Garden tonight......

At what point do we ready the panic buttons? Two legitimate losses to two legitimate good teams (LA, Portland), one stinker that can be chalked up to Laker hangover (G.State)...but then, this, now. The Celtics' eight-game winning streak against the Knicks, which stretched back to those prehistoric pre-KG teams, is over. The C's looked flat, couldn't keep up with New York's speed and intensity, and fell 100-88. Doc Rivers, who spent much of the night in this exact pose, summed it up succinctly: "I thought they played harder than......

Well, it had to end sometime. The Bruins' longest winning streak since 1973 came in emphatic fashion, as the boys were outworked and outplayed by the Sabres at the Garden yesterday. Buffalo scored twice early, and it was a hole the B's never got out of, as they didn't get a lot of shots on Justin Miller and flat-out missed some of the shots they did get. The Bruins were united in their assessment of what went wrong. Shane Hnidy: "We didn't capitalize on our chances." Zdeno Chara: "We had some really good chances, some quality chances.......

We know we have it good here in Boston when we sigh with relief over a Celtics win and think to ourselves that things are right back to the way they're supposed to be. Of course the wheel of fortune will take another turn for us at some point, leaving us without the expectation of winning, but for now...well, we know we're lucky, so that should count for humility, right? The Celtics welcomed the Washington Wizards into town last night and immediately demonstrated that their recent road......

This is getting a little out of control. Even Bruins goaltender Manny Fernandez realizes this: "It is unbelievable to do what we are doing...looking at those numbers kinds of scares me." The numbers he's talking about: 10 wins in a row, 9-0 for Manny at home, two regulation losses since Halloween. And two straight over the Penguins, who came to the Garden last night and left sad and disappointed like so many before, after another Manny spectacle and a 4-2 Bruins win. Manny saved 30 Pittsburgh shots, the......