It took the return of Kendrick Perkins and an obligatory standing ovation from the Garden faithful for the Boston Celtics to put forth their most inspiring performance of the season. And they still lost by nine points at home.
Granted, it was an Oklahoma City team that is absolutely on fire and has the best scorer on the planet suiting up for them. But Kevin Durant wasn't the issue tonight. Sure, he scored 28 points, but it felt like a very quiet 28 points. He never took over like I—and everyone else—was expecting him to once the game came into question. Durant left that to Russell Westbrook and Thabo Sefolosha.
The two Thunder guards combined for four dagger three-pointers in the final two minutes after the Celtics had cut what had been a 10-point OKC lead down to three. And they weren't wide open shots where they had all the time in the world to set themselves and unload. No, these were highly-contested, in-your-face, step-on-your-heart-and-squish-it-...
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