Here Come The C's

Well the Raptors are hopeful to have Jose Calderon back today. But I would suggest defensively at least that may not be a great thing. Rajon Rondo is one of the fastest guys in the league and for a guy that is coming off a hamstring injury that could be bad news. Not even getting into Calderon's defensive challenges when he is healthy. But Boston has been struggling like we have not seen perhaps in the entire era since Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen came to town to form the Boston Big 3. A Christmas Day loss to the Lakers snapping a 19 game win streak has sent the Celtics into a tail spin. They have loses to the Warriors,Knicks and Bobcats. I mean what the heck is going on in Boston?

Let's look back on the two previous match-ups

On November 10 it was the big 3 of Garnett, Allen and Pierce combined for 76 points. They held Chris Bosh in check with just 9 points. Jermaine O'Neal had his best game as a Raptor to that point with 23 points and 11 rebounds. He is not expected to play today from what has been said of late. It was a game that the Raptors had come out like gang busters only to see Paul Pierce give a personal display on why he was Finals M.V.P. In the end it was a 94-87 win for Boston. This was also that famous game that saw K.G talking smack with Jose Calderon that got so much attention. If you need a reminder here is the box score from that game.

Nov 10th @ Boston

On The Dino Blogger's Birthday which is November 23 rd if you are planing ahead. That did not provide a present of a win from the Raptors for me. Boston would remember how the Raptors almost embarrassed and they came out and had a balanced team scoring effort. They had all 5 starters and 2 players off the bench score in double figures. They would start off with a 32-20 first quarter and not look back. They would roll on to a 118-103 victory. If you would like to look back on that one no problem.

Nov 23 @ ACC

The next two Chapters of this story will be written in the next 48 hours. The NBA schedule is strange. The Raptors finish with the Celtics but have yet to play the Knicks or Bulls who they will see 4 times before the end of the season. Not that the Raptors will miss seeing Boston at all. The Raptors will hope the Celtics struggles last just a couple more days. But I have to be honest I think the Celtics see this as a huge chance to get back on track and will look to do just that.

In fact since Christmas the Celtics have only beat 2 teams which are team the Raptors have beat since Christmas as well. The Kings and the Wizards. The Raptors are the hot team coming into this game winners of 6 of their last 10 and 4 of the last 5. While the Celtics are on a 4 game slide and just 3-7 in their last 10 games. All this being said I am still very concerned and you should be too. Boston is not going to keep losing like this for much longer. So that was a short game set-up as this is an early 12:30 tip at the ACC on a Sunday.