Game Notes: Boston and Minnesota at London
KG faces his old team already.
By Keith Firmin
I got to the game just after tip-off at the o2 arena as every food place had a huge waiting list and I was starving.
The arena was only 3⁄4 full 2 minutes into the game but over the course of the first period it filled up.
* Getting straight to the only team anybody cares about in this match-up: The Celtics - Obviously the big three were the main attraction but it was only Jesus who showed up for what he can do. He was hitting every shot last night and it was interesting to see how many of those were wide open. If that’s the way it’s gonna roll for the Celtics all season, then the NBA better look out coz Ray will knock them down all day and night.
* KG seemed to show no emotional ties to the T-Wolves, which was unusual. I don’t know whether I wanted to see him still joking with the Wolves or whether I wanted him to be passionate for the Celtics cause. Just weird overall. But he played okay. Not a lot of points but created problems, getting doubled on almost every play and getting some smooth assists.
* Paul Pierce - Looked slightly overweight (he’s never looked in great shape) and looked lost out there. He didn’t get many great looks at the hoop and what he did get, he didn’t finish. Paul was probably the biggest disappointment tonight.
* For the Wolves, Ricky Davis was hitting everything early on and by ‘everything’ I mean EVERYTHING. Step back threes, pull up J’s, he was just feeling it. But that was the first quarter and the first quarter only. After that he didn’t do anything else. I don’t think he passed the ball once the entire game.
* Other than Ricky, the only other interesting point for Minnesota was when the inflatable headed wolf came on the court during a time-out. He bumbled around for a bit, licking people’s heads and stumbling around. As he was leaving the court he head butted a few security guards which everyone laughed about and then, just as he was about to walk down the players tunnel, a fan went WWE on his a$$! The guy clotheslined him sending him to the floor. Laughter all round.
* Al Jefferson didn’t really show up and Cory Brewer had more points than fouls.
Wondering how the Celtics bench performed? They performed okay as it goes. They looked shaky initially when they entered for the second and fourth quarters but soon got into some plays and settled down. Scalebrine looked the best bench player hitting a bunch of open shots. As for Posey? Well, he kinda disappointed…
Something to look out for as the season goes on - just how fat can Glenn Davis of the Celts get? He’s not a round mound of rebound. He’s the round mound who ways 400 pound.
Famous faces at the arena - R’N'B singer Lemar (you guys possibly won’t know him), football/soccer player - Didier Drogba got booed on front court. All credit to him, he laughed it off. A few other football players were there who no-one recognised - Nigel Reo-Coker, Hayden Mullins and Anton Ferdinand who was sitting next to F1 ace Lewis Hamilton. No-one recognised Anton but EVERYONE knew Lewis.
Most worrying point of the night - in the program for the game, the picture of Theo Ratliff for his player profile. He’s looking over his shoulder in a ‘come and get me boys’ kinda way. T-Wolves teammates… be scared.
49 Responses to “Game Notes: Boston and Minnesota at London”
Oct.11 at 9:21 am
Sam Rubenstein says:
thanks Keith! FIRST!!!
Oct.11 at 9:26 am
Sam Rubenstein says:
p.s. three of the top 4 stories on sportscenter this morning:
1) This game. KG.
2) Randy Moss playing great for Patriots.
3) Indians in ALCS, no Twins.
I think I finally get what “Feeling Minnesota” is supposed to mean.
Oct.11 at 9:27 am
Andrew says:
Nicely done Keith. NBA need to make this an annual event. A question, i saw KG catching up with Drogba, wassup there?
Oct.11 at 9:29 am
Andrew says:
And a fashion disaster last night, Drogba and Darren Bent (Spurs player) were wearing the same jacket.
Oct.11 at 9:31 am
Adrian says:
Speaking of celebrities, my friend was at the game and got a picture with DJ Jazzy Jeff.
Oct.11 at 9:32 am
Jake says:
Eddie House looked surprisingly good out there too actually. I went to a heat game a few years ago when they still had him and he played alot different last night than I remember. Somewhere in the last few years he’s learned how to pass!!One of the other interesting things that no one is mentioning…Rashad McCants.He played well last night with the minutes he had,but where is he going to fit into the rotation?They have Brewer,Gomes,Green at the 3 and then Foye,Pretty Ricky,Marko Jaric and Bassy in the backcourt already.think they could get a good center for him and Theo Ratliff or Blount?
Oct.11 at 9:34 am
Keith says:
Thanks guys, it was all my pleasure! And thanks for posting it Sam.
I was gonna start a premature M-V-P chant when Garnett went to the line to shoot some freebies but felt I may be booed. I didn’t really fancy that.
Oct.11 at 9:36 am
Sam Rubenstein says:
espn is filming a behind the scenes with the Celtics thing. There were some soccer players at practice. THat could be why. Also KG is calling them the “Ceatles” which is pronounced like The Beatles with a C.
Also Stu Scott intro’d the piece with a spoken word poetry thing. It was… um… very uh… um… oh boy.
Oct.11 at 9:37 am
Keith says:
I forgot to add the most critical of information - The Boston cheerleaders are HOT. I’m following Boston from now on.
Oct.11 at 9:44 am
h-town nick says:
isn’t cory brewer having more points then fouls a good thing…
Oct.11 at 9:45 am
h-town nick says:
he says, while using the wrong “than”
Oct.11 at 9:47 am
Russ Bengtson says:
Thing is, who would KG really catch up with on the Wolves anyway? Half the team is new, and the other half wasn’t any good anyway. “Hey Ricky, thanks for all the help the past couple years. No, of course I’m not being serious. Jerk.” Although I’d like to see Kevin “catch up” with Marko Jaric by busting him over the head with a chair.
Oct.11 at 9:51 am
carl says:
Keith…. Cheerleaders are HOT? What sort of comment is that to make mate?
Oct.11 at 9:53 am
Andrew says:
I reckon Wolves should change their jersey to erase traces of KG.
Oct.11 at 10:11 am
Jared says:
Big Baby dropped weight…he tried…BTW…is Craig Smith the most brolic NBA player ever? Not to take anything away from Antonio Davis, ZO, or Boykins (yea, hoopheads kno), but Craig Smith looks like a black “Beast” from X-Men, dude will eat someone…
Oct.11 at 10:18 am
Keith says:
My bad H-town nick…I meant ‘more fouls than points’…
Oct.11 at 10:22 am
Keith says:
Totally agree Russ. I guess it just seemed weird that he wasn’t a Timberwolf anymore. Still not sure about Doc Rivers being the coach for this team though.
Oct.11 at 10:35 am
Hoop Dreamz says:
This was the perfect post for Tarzan to make his obligatory comment about Big Baby’s diet… where is he? Anyways, I’d be surprised not seeing KG chummy with his ex-teammates too, he’s all love
Oct.11 at 10:44 am
Gilbert0 says:
hate to be a spelling nazi, but ways 400pounds??
Oct.11 at 10:51 am
Keith says:
Yep, my grammar at 8 in the morning isn’t all that good. Sue me.
Oct.11 at 11:04 am
Bryce says:
I could have sworn it was intentional seeing that pounds does not really rhyme with mound - it would have been mounds with pounds to be the correct usage - so basically f*ck off gilbert
Oct.11 at 11:06 am
Bryce says:
…round, mound, rebound, pound
Oct.11 at 11:07 am
Gilbert0 says:
thanks for the kind words Bryce, does anything else look wrong with the sentence I posted, I’ll give you a sec to weigh it up.
Oct.11 at 11:13 am
Bryce says:
I’m just f*cking with you dude…sorry, I’m just happy to be done with school for the weekend, we are going to beat wake tonight, and I have time to dedicate to slam blogs
Oct.11 at 11:19 am
Hisham says:
haha Bryce you suck..
Oct.11 at 11:19 am
Hisham says:
you still don’t see it do you?
Oct.11 at 11:24 am
Bryan says:
I can’t stand Stu Scott…I think you guys linked to this cartoon making fun of him once that was amazing but I can’t find it anymore.
Oct.11 at 11:40 am
Allenp says:
Russ is right. KG is more likely to pull out a handgun and kill all the people on the T-Wolves team than he is to be exchanging high fives. Except maybe Mark Madsen.
Oct.11 at 11:54 am
Myles Brown says:
That game was painful to watch. The Wolves really need to solve their point guard situation.
Oct.11 at 12:11 pm
Keith says:
At best the T-wolves were clumsy offensively. At worst they were clueless. And now that KG has moved on, they have no inside threat at all. Wolves fans, it’s gonna be a long hard year…
Oct.11 at 12:18 pm
Bryan says:
MAYBE they don’t wanna expose their bag of tricks just yet.
Oct.11 at 12:21 pm
Myles Brown says:
They have just as much if not more of an inside threat in Al Jefferson. No dis, KG was just never attached to the blocks like that.
Oct.11 at 12:42 pm
underdog says:
Biggest surprise for me was Randy Foye only got 7 minutes.
Oct.11 at 1:10 pm
Sam Rubenstein says:
finally, here’s the stu scott thing: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=waEdU6T8hpc
Very… I don’t know
Oct.11 at 1:31 pm
Silent Storm says:
Next cover has to be the big three
Oct.11 at 4:11 pm
John E. Sanford says:
Stu Scott does realize he’s damn near 50 right? I mean its alright to be into hip-hop and all that, but when he does stuff like this it makes him look like a total jackass. He is part of the reason I don’t really watch Sportscenter anymore.
Oct.11 at 4:18 pm
Graeme says:
Nicely done, Keith.
Oct.11 at 4:19 pm
Myles Brown says:
co-sign.
Oct.11 at 8:28 pm
DannyW_UK says:
Nuthin to do with this post, but. I don’t like Ethan Thomas, he’s a ball player not a freedom fighter/politician. However, sorry to hear about his problem. Get well soon, hope to see you back on the court this season.
Oct.11 at 9:10 pm
franco says:
The KG-Drogba thing is that KG lives in cali in the offseason, Droggles was there w/ chelski for pre-season and he got to know KG a bit.
ALso Pierce was at Chelski practices in LA this summer so I guess they all know each other.
Oct.11 at 9:45 pm
nothin _personal says:
I am watching the Panathinaikos vs Rockets game. The defensive 3s rule is the main difference between the two worlds, and I think it’s the reason team Usa will always be a step slower when they are playing in international competitions
Oct.11 at 10:37 pm
Balling NZ says:
Bring the NBA to NZ maaaaan!!!
Oct.12 at 4:09 am
el-z says:
i was at this game and it was sick……ray allen was on point kool
Peace!!
Oct.12 at 6:43 am
Ho-Llamas says:
The atmosphere at this game was terrible. The crowd cheer when there was a Mexican wave happening. I blame lousy English fans. And Lewis hamilton is a fake fan cos he didn’t turn up ’til half-time
Oct.12 at 8:42 am
miles says:
I would say the game was quite a dissapointment…I mean the NBA has one chance to win over fans and thats the show they put on? Being a Vancouverite (Vancouver, Canada) living in London I was appalled.. The game itself was weak but worse was the show…I mean no food, the items on sale you could get at any store and they didn’t really create a good buzz..come on NBA you’ll lose fans if you do that again!
Oct.12 at 11:42 am
el-z says:
i agree that this match had a bad atmosphere but it was my first time seeing an nba match (first time nba in england for 10 years) and jus seeing the players in person was amazing
Peace!!!
Oct.12 at 12:26 pm
silverselectjd says:
dude, the game sucked. also i was seated above the tunnel where the inflatable wolf dude exited and i didnt see anyone go “WWE on his a$$”. i saw 1 dude punch him but no clothesline… And yeah, the atmosphere sucked. seemed more a case of people wanting to see the game just for the sake of seeing it, only a handful of real hoops fans. plus the scheduled time outs killed the atmosphere, at one point the ball was in play and the timeout buzzer went. wrong, wrong, wrong!
Oct.12 at 12:52 pm
rav says:
best bit of the night - drogba getting booed when on the big screen! to his credit it saw the funny side, even though he had his iPod on during the game
Oct.21 at 6:58 am
Diego says:
Hi NBA Fans,
Does anybody have some pictures from Boston-Minnesota game. Especially from the shooting contest in the 3rd quarter? I was one of the fans chosen to participate and I am now looking for someone who has picture of it (myself)
Thanks