Remembering what life would be like without KG

It's easy to forget that the Celtics acquired KG a couple days after trading for Ray Allen two summers ago. There is a reason why people (myself included) weren't that excited about a team that only slightly upgraded by trading for Ray Allen. Garnett is a difference-maker as he proved last season in Boston's championship run.

The C's lose its defensive identity when Garnett (flu) is forced to miss a game like he did yesterday afternoon against his former team, the Minnesota Timberwolves.

Boston (40-9) did just enough for a 109-101 home win over the youthful Timberwolves (16-30) in a Super Bowl matinee. Oh by the way, it was the Green's 11th consecutive victory.

Still, it was a reality check of what life would have been like without KG; the Celts would be fighting for home court in the Eastern Conference and would not be title contenders.

Paul Pierce led Boston with a game-high 36 points, eight rebounds and six assists. Ray Allen added 22 points and Tony Allen scored 14 off the bench. In only his second career start, Glen Davis notched 12 points, six boards and three steals.

Kendrick Perkins scored eight points and grabbed 11 rebounds while Rajon Rondo had five points, eight assists and seven rebounds.

Minnesota was paced by its star, former Celtic Al Jefferson, who had 34 points, 14 rebounds and four blocks. It's a joke that he didn't make the All-Star team this season in the West.

Randy Foye added 21 points and nine assists while former Providence College star and Celtic Ryan Gomes notched 17 points and four steals. Sebastian Telfair, the other ex-Celtic, had 10 points and eight assists.

Boston jumped out a sizable lead after a 29-24 first quarter and 33-20 second quarter. The T-Wolves came back in the third (29-25) and fourth (28-22) but Pierce would not let his team choke away such a winnable game.

The Celts travel to Philly tomorrow night and Garnett's status is up in the air.

Two Jagerbombs chief: Devils beat Bruins, 4-3 in OT

As if the world needed further proof that nobody outside of it likes New Jersey, the Devils are one of the most underrated franchises in recent sports history. They won a few Stanley Cups and they're almost always tough to beat since they play an aggressive forechecking and defensive game.

After taking care of the Southeast-leading Capitals on Tuesday night, the Bruins tangled with the Atlantic-leading Devils at the Garden last night. New Jersey skated away with a hard-earned 4-3 overtime win thanks to Jamie Langenbrunner's second goal of the game.

The Devils (31-15-3) jumped on the Bruins (35-8-6) with a goal in the first and second before Boston finally woke up.

Langenbrunner (11th) started it with a shorthanded tally from Travis Zajac in the first.

Zach Parise scored his 29th goal of the season, this one on the power play, in the second with assists to Langenbrunner and Paul Martin.

The B's shook off the cobwebs and scored three straight goals in 13:30 of the third. First, Chuck Kobasew (9th) found the net with help from Patrice Bergeron and Andrew Ferance.

Next, Marc Savard (18th) poked home a shot after Phil Kessel (returning after missing six games due to mono) and Milan Lucic worked it around.

Finally, Dennis Wideman potted his 10th, which looked like it would be the game-winner for the Bruins, who made a nice comeback after a pretty lifeless first two periods. Kessel and Savard had the helpers.

It was not to be though as Langenbrunner beat Tim Thomas once more in overtime. It was a classic Devils goal: not a beauty but very effective. Langenbrunner was right in front of the crease and slid the rebound past a sprawled out Thomas.

Boston will look to regroup (and get out to a faster start) in tomorrow's matinee against the New York Rangers.

Eddie House will tell you when he's had enough

I don't think I've ever seen a shooter in the NBA as hot as Eddie House is right now.

He had a season-high 28 points last night, including a blistering 8-of-9 on 3-pointers as the Boston Celtics put away the Sacramento Kings, 119-100 at the Garden for its ninth straight win.

In three of his last four games, he's combined to shoot 22-of-31 on threes. He's making a late case to be included in the 3-point shootout at the All-Star Weekend in Phoenix.

The Celts (38-9) actually started out slowly as the Kings (10-37) hit 10 of its first 11 shots from the field. No problem though as Sacramento led 30-28 after the first and Boston came back with a 40-19 second quarter sparked by House's in the zone shooting.

The third quarter (29-24 Kings) and fourth, 27-22 Celtics were just semantics as the second quarter was enough to put away the NBA's second-worst team (I'm looking at you Wizards).

Besides House, the other revelation during the win streak has been the much-improved play of the Boston bench. Tony Allen returned last night and had 10 points, eight rebounds, three steals and three assists. Glen Davis also added 14 points.

Rajon Rondo also stated his case for a spot in Phoenix, in the All-Star game, by scoring 24 points and dishing out nine assists. Kevin Garnett had 14 points, eight boards and five assists while Ray Allen notched 12 points. Paul Pierce was held to eight points and eight assists.

John Salmons led the Kings with 22 points while impressive rookie Jason Thompson had a double-double with 21 points and 11 rebounds. Kevin Martin scored 18 points, Bobby Brown (the other one) had 13 points off the bench and Brad Miller posted 11 points in the loss.

For the game, the C's shot 55.0% to Sacramento's 44.0%. They also had seven more rebounds (40-33) and 12 more assists (30-18). Finally, the Celts had nine steals to the Kings' two.

Boston hits the road tomorrow night to face the struggling Detroit Pistons.

The Bruins laugh at your injury problems

In the first game of the unofficial second half of the season (after the All-Star break), the Boston Bruins were able to do something which they couldn't do earlier in the season: beat the Washington Capitals.

It wasn't exactly a piece of art but the B's (35-8-5) avenged two previous losses to the Caps (30-15-4) with a 3-2 overtime win last night at the Garden.

And the best news of the night for Boston was that three of its key injured players returned to action: Patrice Bergeron, Milan Lucic and Andrew Ference were all back on the ice.

David Krejci (from Dennis Wideman and Zdeno Chara) won it with his 18th goal of the year, on a 4-on-3 power play. Krejci tried to pass across the crease to Marc Savard but the puck deflected off Washington defenseman Shaone Morrison's skate and past Capitals goalie Jose Theodore.

Washington took a 1-0 lead 2:08 into the game as defenseman Mike Green (his 13th; from Alexander Semin and Alex Ovechkin) beat B's goalie Tim Thomas with a slap shot.

Bruins enforcer Shawn Thornton had a rare moment of goal-scoring prowess as he potted an unassisted goal (his fourth) at 9:26 of the first.

The Capitals came right back with a late goal (21 seconds left) in the first by Michael Nylander (5th), from Tomas Fleischmann and Chris Clark.

Savard (17th) tied it in the second with a power-play goal from Bergeron. Playing right wing, instead of his normal center, Bergeron kept the puck in the Capitals zone with a dive and then he found Savard, who put the wrister in the net.

Neither team scored in the third but Bruins rookie Byron Bitz tangled with Capitals goon Donald Brashear. Many feel that Brashear is the best fighter in the NHL so it was no surprise that he won the battle but Bitz still gave his team some life.

Fresh off the All-Star game appearance, Thomas improved to 21-5-4 with 34 saves, including two showstoppers on Nicklas Backstrom and Ovechkin in overtime. He'll have to carry the load for an undetermined amount of time since Manny Fernandez is out with an undisclosed injury.

Another division leader, the New Jersey Devils come to the Garden tomorrow night as the Bruins' schedule the next few weeks is loaded with quality opponents.

Mark Cuban must be loving life

The Dallas Mavericks are frauds. Since losing in the NBA finals in 2006, they've continually gotten worse. Good regular seasons have been followed by quick playoff exits. Avery Johnson was fired and Rick Carlisle is now the head coach but things don't appear to be changing in Big D.

Yesterday, the Boston Celtics took the Mavs behind the woodshed-in this case the Garden-for a 124-100 win that wasn't that close.

The Celts' (37-9) eighth straight win gave them the exact same record that they had last season thru 46 games.

Boston was led by its threesome of Kevin Garnett, Ray Allen (7 assists) and Eddie House, who all scored 23 points. Rajon Rondo added 13 points, 14 assists, seven rebounds and four steals.

For Dallas (25-19), Jason Terry had 27 points off the bench while Josh Howard and Dirk Nowitzki each had 18 quiet, useless points.

The early afternoon (1 p.m.) start for ABC was no problem for the C's as they jumped on Dallas early: 38-23 after the first quarter. Not to be outdone, Boston scored a season-high 74 points in the first half, while the Mavs had 47. Game over.

The starters didn't have to play in the fourth as the bench held its own for the Green.

Boston shot 53.8% in the game, to Dallas' 42.1%. Led by House (7) and Allen (4), the Celts made 16 3-pointers. Dallas had a 30-8 free throws made advantage and they still got smoked.

The assist margin was 34-12 for the C's, who also only committed six turnovers. There were silly numbers all over the place in this laugher.

Expect more of the same as the Sacramento Kings come to the Garden tomorrow night. The Kings haven't beaten an Eastern Conference team this whole season. Really.

Celtics take back mantle of NBA's best

With last night's thrilling 90-80 win over the Orlando Magic at the Amway Arena, the Boston Celtics proved once again that they are the team to beat in the Eastern Conference and the NBA as a whole.

The Cavs lost Delonte West to a broken wrist last week so they're just a notch below and while the Magic (33-9) had been playing great-they came in winners of seven straight-they're not the defending champions.

The C's (36-9) have gotten back to their defensive roots that led them to the title and the 27-2 start this season. The win was their seventh in a row.

On a night when the NBA All-Star starters were announced, Paul Pierce proved why he's NBA elite, even if he'll have to make the East squad as a reserve.

The Truth had a game-high 27 points, 10 rebounds, four assists and two steals. Kevin Garnett had 16 points and five rebounds. The key to the win, other than the air-tight D was the play of Glen Davis. Big Baby had a season-high 16 points and actually outplayed Magic center Dwight Howard (11 points, 11 rebounds, 3 blocks), who he covered most of the time he was in.

Ray Allen added 12 points, Rajon Rondo had nine points and eight rebounds and Kendrick Perkins managed seven points, seven boards and two blocks in 25 minutes as Doc Rivers tries to ease him back into the lineup.

Orlando has one of the best starting fives in the league but where they might run into trouble in the playoffs is their pathetic bench. It combined for a measly ten points last night.

Hedo Turkoglu led the Magic with 22 points and Rashard Lewis had a double-double himself with 20 points and 10 rebounds but it wasn't enough. Jameer Nelson notched 17 points.

The C's led 24-19 after the first quarter and 44-36 at the half. That lead was extended to 65-54 and Boston was able to hold off Orlando in the fourth (26-25 Magic).

For the game, the Celts shot 46.7% to the Magic's 38.2%. That offset the fact that Boston didn't make a 3-pointer (0-6) and Orlando had seven.

The Green and White came home and will face the up and down Dallas Mavericks on Sunday afternoon at the Garden.

I think this All-Star break was well-earned

In your wildest, alcohol and peyote-induced dreams, did you ever think the Boston Bruins would have an NHL-best (tied with San Jose) 73 points heading into the 2009 All-Star break? Of course not, no matter how much you abused your body, you still wouldn't have been crazy enough to expect this most unexpected of seasons thus far.

The B's (34-8-5) fittingly went into the break with a come-from-behind 4-3 shootout win in Toronto over the Maple Leafs (17-22-8) last night.

Michael Ryder clinched it with a goal as the fourth shooter in the shootout after Tim Thomas had stoned Nikolai Kulemin.

Toronto outplayed Boston for the first two periods. Jason Blake (Lee Stempniak, Dominic Moore) put the Leafs up 1-0 in the first. Blake Wheeler (14th) from Aaron Ward and David Krejci tied it up a little over a minute later.

Stempniak's power-play goal (Blake, Moore) and Brad May's (John Mitchell, Jamal Mayers) gave Toronto the 3-1 advantage in the second.

The Bruins used two power-play goals from defensemen in the third to send it to overtime.

First, Dennis Wideman (9th) scored off assists from Krejci and Ryder. Next, captain Zdeno Chara (11th goal) tipped in a perfect feed down low from Marc Savard (and P.J. Axelsson).

Thomas made 31 saves, inching his record to 20-5-4.

Thomas, Savard, Chara and head coach Claude Julien will go to Montreal for the All-Star Game festivities this weekend while the rest of the team gets a welcome rest.

Boston next meets the Capitals on Tuesday back at the Garden.