Celtics’ Big Three leave floor united as champions

By Steve Buckley | Wednesday, June 18, 2008 | http://www.bostonherald.com | Boston Celtics

Photo by Matthew West
The only thing missing was William “The Refrigerator” Perry plunging into the end zone for a touchdown.

You remember that one, right?

It was that one-sided for the Celtics [team stats] last night at the Garden. It was so one-sided, in fact, that the pinch-me, scrapbook, call-the-neighbors, wake-the-kids moment in the Celtics’ 131-92 championship-clinching victory over the Los Angeles Lakers did not come at the end, when a disgusted Jordan Farmar rolled the ball away like a candlepin bowl as the clock pounded down to 00:00.

No. The time on the clock that people will remember, the number that will float through the ages, passed on from generation to generation like an old watch, is 4:01.

It was then when Celtics coach Doc Rivers removed Paul Pierce [stats], Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen from the game. It wasn’t Doc’s greatest decision as a coach but it absolutely was his greatest decision as a dramatist.

This season, this ride, this history, began with Danny Ainge pressing the right buttons, pulling the right levers by adding Garnett and Allen to Pierce, which instantly brought back something that had been missing from this franchise for many years: respectability.

Having been a big nothing for so long, the Celtics again had a Big Three. We could roll back the videotape and show you eight months of highlights, but why bother? What you saw last night was a microcosm of their entire season - three great players coming together as one, putting egos aside, playing for the common good. It would be so trite, so hackneyed, so lame, were it not so true.

On defense, they helped smother the Lakers, and on the other side of the court, they combined for 69 points - 26 from Garnett, 26 from Allen and 17 from Pierce. They were so good, and the Celtics so dominant, that the Fridge moment took place when Rivers looked up at the Jumbotron, saw the 4:01 up there and turned the Big Three into three spectators.

“I just thought about it a minute before that,” Rivers said. “They came in as a group, and I thought we should take them out as a group . . . I was unprepared for anything at the end of the game. It’s probably sweeter that way.”

The subplots here are fascinating.

Pierce was wheeled into the locker room with a knee injury in Game 1 and returned to throw in a couple of 3-pointers in the win. Garnett was so bad in Game 5 at Staples Center, a 103-98 Celtic loss, that he referred to his performance as “trash.” And Allen, while out in Los Angeles, was stunned to hear that his 17-month-old son had been diagnosed with diabetes.

Yet there they were, one for all, all for won, stuck in traffic on Route 4:01.

“I just took a deep breath, looked up at the score, and said, ‘Hey, it finally happened, man,’ ” said Pierce, a Celtic his entire career and a man so locked into the tradition of the franchise that he thanked the late, great Red Auerbach for helping a testy free-throw attempt to fall threw the net in Game 7 of the Cleveland second-round series.

It should be noted that the Big Three hated being called the Big Three. As Allen put it, “We did our best to somewhat downplay it, because Big Three, it was a Big 15. We have 15 guys on this team that have contributed all year.”

But the reality is that Rivers gave diplomatic recognition to the sovereignty of this 21st-century Big Three, when, with 4:01 remaining, he removed Pierce, Garnett and Allen as a unit. Rivers never said a word, yet he had made a statement: Yes, absolutely, it really is a Big Three.

“Ya’ll got to give us a new nickname,” Garnett said. “I know you’re all more creative than the Big Three, so let us hear it.”

They’ve been called everything from the Three Amigos to Three Men and a (Big) Baby. Whatever you call them, just be sure you call them together. That’s what Doc did last night when the clock hit 4:01.