Celtics Crush the Lakers

In front of several Hall-of-Fame players and former champions, the Boston Celtics smashed the Lakers in Game Six of the NBA Finals Tuesday, 131-92.

The Celtics returned to glory in dominating fashion. The NBA Finals series was really over after Game Four; after Game Six it became official.

The greatest single-season turnaround in NBA history was completed. The Lakers held on to win two games at home in this series, but neither victory gave any indication they could win this series.

The Celtics were the best team in the NBA all season, as their record indicated; it became written in stone and proven in the Finals.

The Celtics earned this championship by beating every competitor and meeting every challenge.

Boston annihilated Los Angeles in Game Six the same way they did all series, using barbed-wire defense on Kobe Bryant and the Lakers, getting in the face of every player and making life difficult, demolishing bookend forwards Pau Gasol and Lamar Odom and exploiting their lack of a strong interior defender, shot blocker at the rim and physical rebounder.

The Lakers were in the game and down only four points at the end of the first quarter, 24-20. The game was still within reach at 32-29 in the second quarter until the Lakers couldn’t identify the shooters and the Celtics went on an 11-0 run to distance themselves.

The Boston Celtics weren’t finished proving the point that they were the better team this game, and that this was their moment. The Celtics were determined to finish what they started last October and dropped a 26-6 scoring run on the Lakers to take a series-clinching, 58-35 lead at halftime—but the Celtics were not done.

The epic defensive displayed by the Celtics all series was phenomenal, but was still turned up to another level in the third quarter. The Lakers were shut down defensively and killed in the rebounding column all series. While administering another historic beat down, the Celtics erupted like a volcano with an avalanche of points that didn’t stop until the scoreboard read 131-92.

The Lakers had a phenomenal season, going further than anyone expected with a young team. They won the tough Western Conference, but the Celtics were not going to be derailed from their goal of winning a championship.

The Lakers were favored to win the series by many analysts, but were turned into debris on the train tracks—and this writer picked the Lakers to win the series in six games. I knew that the Celtics were a veteran team with a tremendous defense, which I thoroughly respected, but I felt that the Lakers had a small window to do something great and they would have to for them to pull off this win.

That small window closed when the Lakers lost Game Two.

The Lakers appeared shook from the energy that the Celtics generated. The Lakers fell so hard that people out in Cali thought it was an earthquake.

The Lakers were smacked around all series, and Tuesday was merely the culmination. The Celtics proved during the season that they wouldn’t discriminate and that they could beat the best in the East and the West.

The best way to describe what happened would be like discussing severe weather.

Going through the regular season and the Western Conference playoffs was like spring and summer weather, then the Lakers had to deal with some heavy rain, hail and thunderstorms with several dark clouds.

Once the Lakers played against the Boston Celtics defense, they had to have felt as if they were caught up in a multiple vortex tornado. In my mind's eye I could see the entire team spinning around in a twister.

The Los Angeles Lakers had a great season. They have a nice nucleus to build upon and need a few more pieces to add to the team blueprint to reach this point again. Despite the beat down they’ll remain competitive in 2009.

Congratulations to the Boston Celtics: the 2008 NBA Champions! A complete team with a tremendous coaching staff comprised of three veteran superstars, a solid bench with an excellent mix of experienced veterans and youth.

The World Champion Boston Celtics were just better and beat the Los Angeles Lakers in every way.