If you're going to have a triumphant homecoming, it helps when you're playing the Timberwolves. That's the lesson from last night, as Kevin Garnett played his first game back in his old arena, and clearly illustrated the difference between NBA Champs and a miserable team, as the Celtics cruised to a 95-78 blowout. KG missed the game in "'Sota", as he's always called it, last year with an injury. But he was there last night,......

Maybe the Celtics took a page from the Bruins, who fell way behind Buffalo and then blew them out on Wednesday. Maybe KG was rusty after missing a game. Whatever happened, the C's dug themselves a quick 13-2 hole, then spent the rest of the night pounding a ragged-looking Detroit team for a 98-80 win that (as they say) wasn't nearly that close. All the postgame buzz was about Rajon Rondo, who scored 18 points,......

Nothing is getting to the Bruins right now. Nothing can disturb their calm, shake their confidence, rattle their cages. Buffalo jumps out to a 3-1 lead in the first five minutes? Pfffft. Just nod grimly and get back to work. David Krejci scored to make it 3-2. Manny Fernandez got beat for the fourth and final time. Then Buffalo goalie Ryan Miller faced the wrath of the Bruins, as Marc Savard got him for another......

Let's take one more minute to salute Dustin Pedroia, since it's really the last order of business for the 2008 Red Sox. He's come a long way in two short years, judging by what Dan Shaughnessy said then and what he says now. He's impressed everyone he's played with and against - well, everyone except Dallas writer Evan Grant, who didn't even put him in the top ten. And he's given inspiration to scrappy little......

No local games yesterday. The Celtics spent yesterday catching their breath, and in Brian Scalabrine's case, wishing the fans wouldn't single him out so much. Top draft pick J.R. Giddens, who hasn't been seen on the court yet, is on his way to Utah to get some minutes with the Celtics' D-League team. The Bruins still feel good about themselves even after their winning streak was snapped. "It wasn’t like the circus was back in......

Two local teams in action last night, two overtimes. As usual, we'll start with the one that ended well. And at least it ended well. The Celtics, trying to avoid a disastrous two-game losing streak, took a decent second-half lead in Milwaukee and almost squandered it. Nobody in green could buy a basket. The depleted Bucks (no Michael Redd, no Charlie Villanueva) clawed back to tie it at the end. "I'm not going to lie.......

One local team hung on to first place. So let's start with them. Bostonist was dismayed at the volume of Montrealers wandering around Quincy Market around dinnertime. Bostonist recommends that locals go buy tickets to all the upcoming Bruins-Canadiens games at the Garden this year. You'll get to see good hockey, and you'll hopefully get to see some crestfallen Quebecois, as there were last night, as the Bruins kept their red hot streak alive by......

The Hawks are real. We knew they took the Celtics to seven inexplicable games last year, and we knew they were undefeated when they arrived at the Garden last night. And then the game started last night. Sans star Josh Smith, Atlanta relied instead on killer shooting and some crisp passing, hung 31 on the C's in the first quarter, and built a 16-point lead at one point. So it was time for Ghidorah to......

Did everyone have a nice Veteran's Day? Maybe spend a little time outdoors, or get some chores done, or quality time with the loved ones? Good, because forget it for the next couple of days. All three of our local wintery teams take the field/court/ice in the next 48 hours. And they're all pretty big games. We'll start tonight, where the Bruins are taking their winning streak on the road to play a Blackhawk team......

These injury-rattled 2008 Patriots may have finally settled on an identity. And it's not one that's going to please the kind of people who are only pleased by blowouts and offensive explosions. But football purists and fans of efficiency have to be pleased by the Pats' 20-10 win over Buffalo. It was a masterpiece of clock management, a triumph of minimalism. Matt Cassel somehow collected 234 passing yards in the win, but the only images......

This has been a nice little homestand for the Bruins, hasn't it? Last night, they followed up blowouts of Dallas and Toronto with a spirited, come-from-behind 3-1 win over Buffalo that launched them into a flatfooted tie for the Northeast Division lead. It took a little time for the B's to find their rhythm after falling into a fairly quick 1-0 hole. But find it they did, as Dennis Wideman launched a slapshot past Buffalo's......

If the Celtics have proven nothing else in the first games of the 2008-2009 season, it's that fans should never get overly worried when their team is down. On Friday night, Boston again found itself trailing early into play at the TD Banknorth Garden. The Celts again overcame that minor obstacle to handily defeat their opponent. The latest team to fall victim to the Green is the Bucks, who limped out of the venue after......

The Bruins have a nice little streak going on, don't they? After pasting Dallas, 5-1, about a month and a half ago, the Bruins went back on the Garden ice and handed Toronto a 5-2 beating, mostly courtesy of Blake Wheeler's hat trick. Wheeler changed his jersey number before the game (from #42 to 26; sorry, Douglas Adams), and put in goals in all three periods to celebrate. So far, we've had hat tricks this......

It took a little while for the Celtics to find their rhythm yesterday. Maybe it was the tough Houston game, maybe it was getting used to a new arena, maybe it was recovering from the whirlwind afternoon tour of Oklahoma City. We may never know. But even though the C's started off a little (OK, a lot) flat, they turned up the D when it mattered and wound up pretty much cruising to a 96-83......

If you were worried about the Celtics seeking motivation for a repeat, worry no more. Rajon Rondo blogged: "We have to repeat, because we have to go back to the White House to meet Obama." It may not have been the biggest win anyone recorded in the nation last night, but the Celtics took a step towards that next White House visit. They recovered from their stinker in Indiana to beat a Houston team that's......

Three Patriot losses this season. One, to Miami, we can chalk up to inexperience and a tricky Miami team. One, to San Diego...just awful. Last night was the first time this year, and the first time in years, that the Pats went out and truly beat themselves. And spoiled what was mostly a fantastic football game. Where to assign the blame? The easiest culprit is Jabar Gaffney, who had a wide-open express lane to the......

"We want to be greedy," said Claude Julien. And why not? After successively blanking the Oilers and the Canucks on 1-0 scored, the Bruins were hungry and ready to go for the Western Canadian sweep in Calgary. And when Patrice Bergeron caught Flames goalie Miikka Kiprusoff out of position for the quick 1-0 lead, Coach Julien's green looked like it might be rewarded. Alas, it was not. The Flames finally got to Tim Thomas, twice......

Vincent Wilford was called to the Commissioner's carpet yesterday to answer for a series of controversial plays. Wilfork, still a watched man after his hit on Buffalo's J.P. Losman last season, was asked to New York to explain to the Commish his side of a dicey hit on Denver's Jay Cutler a couple weeks ago. They talked it out, the Commish made Wilfork an offer he couldn't refuse, and the meeting ended with Vince a......

Paul Pierce has been here through it all. He slipped to #10 in the draft, becoming such an obvious pick that even Rick Pitino couldn't screw it up. He survived a stabbing. He and Antoine Walker mad-bombed their way into an improbable Eastern Finals appearance. He played through the agony and misery of the dismal mid-00's, always giving it all, always wearing his heart on his sleeve, always waiting for the day to come when......

Hey. If Daisuke Matsuzaka can be the shakiest, scariest 18-3 pitcher in baseball history, why can't the Patriots be the craziest, weakest 5-2 team in football? Maybe being the worst 12-4 team ever is a realistic goal. And why not? The Patriots, for all their injuries and inconsistencies and foibles, have a share of the AFC lead after surviving the Rams 23-16 at Foxboro yesterday. With (it seems) every running back on the roster out......

The Bruins have had bad news this young season, and some eh news. Last night, though, they nabbed an unqualified success, as Milan Lucic notched a hat trick and the B's overcame some early slugginshness to beat Atlanta, 5-4 at the Garden. Stephane Yelle got things rolling for the B's three and a half minutes into the second to cut the lead in half. Lucic tied it at 5:57, and David Krejci retied it at......

Apparently, you're supposed to let the MCL surgery heal before you reconstruct the ACL. It's starting to sound like Tom Brady's been seeing Dr. Nick Riviera, as grim accusations are starting to fly about what exactly is going on with his knee. The Patriots are a little miffed that Brady got the operations done in California. On Tom's website, he says everything's going swimmingly, but that's as of last week. The worst case scenario seems......

If Tom Brady really is about to propose to Gisele, he's just going to have to do it without going down on one knee. Patriots fans are all aflutter about the news that Tom's knee isn't healing right, has needed followup procedures, and the surgery may have to be redone. Oh, fantastic. Speaking of surgery, Terry Francona is making plans for a back operation. Tony Masarotti is already in full Hot Stove League mode, trying......

With all the practice the Bruins have gotten in shootouts this young season, you have to believe they're going to win one at some point. For the third time, they had to accept one point from the OTL while their opponent (in this case, Buffalo) got the extra. "You almost feel like Groundhog Day here," said coach Claude Julien, which makes us realize we haven't seen that in a while. The B's grabbed an early......

So much for that. After the rousing Game Five comeback and the solid Game Six win, you can understand why we thought the experience and the mental toughness of the Sox would win out over the youth and the big dreams of the Rays. And, if the Sox had brought their bats to Tropicana Field last night, the story may well have ended the way we wanted it to. But they didn't, and it just...ended.......

Well. This is fun, isn't it? Left for dead, the Red Sox are now in the enviable position of needing one game to move on to the World Series, and Jon Lester on the hill. There were moments of drama last night - would TBS get its act together? Was B.J. Upton's 74th home run of the postseason a sign that Beckett was cooked? Will all the umpires survive? - but they were erased, and......

Here, in the Bostonist confessional, it's OK to be honest. Did you give up last night? Did you see Daisuke get rocked for five early runs, (and Delcarmen for two more) look at the anemic Sox lineup, and think, "I don't need this agony and misery tonight"? Well...Bostonist did. We threw in a movie, and maybe the title we picked - that silly little preposterous action movie from a couple years ago called Deja Vu......

You want to look on the bright side? OK, we'll play along. The Red Sox have a seven game ALCS winning streak when faced with elimination. There, we said it. Now all they have to do is get a sterling effort from Dice-K tonight, credible efforts from their other shellshocked pitchers, and some semblance of a competent offense, and the Sox can maybe run that streak up to ten. Games Five have been particularly good......

Is history going to repeat itself? Can the button-down boys of '08 remember what happened last year, and four years ago? Is Kevin Millar available for an inspirational speech/booze luge? The Red Sox find themselves in a familiar position - down 3-1 in the ALCS. But we'd be lying if we didn't admit that this feels different. After shellacking Tim Wakefield and company last night, it's pretty obvious that Tampa Bay's got "it". And the......

Well...forget 18-1. The Patriots were chewed up, spit out, massacred and other violent verbs last night in San Diego, as the Chargers finally figured out how to beat the Pats (play them in October, without Tom Brady) and romped to a 30-10 win that really didn't even seem that close. San Diego got out to a 10-0 first-quarter lead, mostly because Philip Rivers carved up the D with a couple long passes. The Patriots alternated......