Boston-Atlanta: NBA's Newest Rivalry?

When Paul Pierce hit his jumper with .5 seconds remaining Wednesday night to beat the Atlanta Hawks 103-102, most NBA fans took notice of the great game between two of the East's top teams thus far in the young '08-'09 season.

The Atlanta Hawks, led by Joe Johnson and Mike Bibby, are a bit of a surprise this season; while the defending champs, Boston Celtics, are picking up where they left off.

Many failed to recall that it was this Hawks team that pushed the Celtics to seven games in the first round of last year's playoffs.

The Hawks strong play early this season has forced many to recognize that their play in the postseason was no fluke.

In those playoffs, Atlanta, who had not been to the playoffs in nine years, continued to claw its way back from deficits. Tempers flared and the flair for the dramatic was on display, at least in the Hawk's home games.

In Boston, the Celtics took care of business each night, winning by an average of 25 points a game but in Atlanta, where the Hawks won all their home games, is where things got testy.

In Game Four, Hawks' reserve center, Zaza Pachulia, did all he could to stop Kevin Garnett. That included getting physical with him.

In the second quarter, Pachulia went nose-to-nose with Garnett and the players and coaches from both teams broke up the potential fray.

Pachulia, Garnett, Johnson, and Celtics guard Sam Cassell all received technical fouls for their actions during this exchange.

But the point was made—the young and inexperienced Hawks were not backing down from the mighty Celtics. This was evident during this moment in Game Four, and throughout the series as Atlanta played a particularly physical brand of basketball.

The remainder of the Celtics playoff run is familiar to most.

Wednesday's exciting last second finish brought back memories of that game, except this time it was in Boston, where the Hawks had previously had little success...especially in last year's playoffs.

But, for many Hawks and Celtics fans, it brought back some more memories and perhaps a rivalry is brewing in the East.

In the '80s, during the Hawks' original heyday, the two teams tangled a few times in the playoffs.

In the 1982-'83 season, the Celtics defeated the Hawks in the first round, 2-1. In '85-'86, Boston won again, 4-1, this time in the Conference Semifinals.

The '87-'88 playoffs is the one that hurts Hawks fans the most.

That Hawks team, led by Doc Rivers (now the Celtics' head coach) and Dominique Wilkins lost by two points each in Games Six and Seven of those playoffs to the Celtics.

Wilkins, now the Hawks' Vice President of Basketball, described Game Six's final play: "In Game Six, the shot by Cliff Levingston was supposed to be for myself or Doc to make a play, and to this day we don't know what happened."

Provided with another chance to close out the series, Game Seven proved to be as memorable.

Trailing 113-105 with 1:43 left, the Hawks managed to come back, carried by Wilkins, who finished the game with 47 points.

With five seconds remaining, after a missed free throw, Wilkins came down with a rebound and drove up-court with the Hawks down by three.

A heads-up foul by Danny Ainge, the current Celtics' President of Basketball Operations, put Wilkins on the line for a difficult make-one-miss-one-rebound-score scenario.

The Hawks failed to come down with the rebound and time expired...as did the Hawks' championship hopes.

2008-'09 is a new season, and the Hawks, still stinging from last year's loss, gave the Celtics all they could handle, as Atlanta lost for the first time on the season.

With the memories of the great games from the '80s, last season's playoffs, and one of this young season's most dramatic games, the Hawks and Celtics are beginning to recreate a rivalry that featured two of the NBA's elite teams.

With three games with Boston remaining, this Hawks team will not only look to gain confidence with wins over the defending champions, but also hope to serve up a preview to NBA fans of a potential East Finals, between what could become two bitter Eastern Conference rivals.