Celtics blow another fourth quarter lead in loss to Lakers(Live Blog)

That was truly a gut wrenching loss.  The fact that we lost two games in that fashion in a matter of four days is really hard to swallow.  The good news is that we can definitely beat this Lakers team, you just can't give Kobe the last shot.   I decided to do a live recap chronicling my thoughts as the game went along.  Here it goes by quarter. By the way, getting Rondo for 55 million is a total steal and Lebron is a way harder cover than Kobe. It's not even close.

1st Quarter:  You can tell the Celtics are pumped up with Pierce and Artest going after it before tip off. After the first few minutes it has been all Lakers. Bynum is killing us inside and the 2 early fouls on Pierce are huge. We need him to have a huge game to win. Tony Allen playing some solid minutes early. Rondo has not been heard from.  Garnett and TA are the only ones playing well. Rasheed gets another technical and will be benched soon. Ray missing open threes.

2nd Quarter: Classic Phil Jackson, being sarcastic with Doris Burke.  TA showed up to play and is doing his best MJ impression finishing around the basket. Definitely didn't expect that. Rondo finally figured out no one on the Lakers can stay in front of him.Great play by TA throwing the ball off Walton. The Celtics 2nd unit is giving them a boost. Jeff Van Gundy is pretty funny. TA is on fire. Lakers are shooting lights out but Celtics are weathering the storm. Rondo huge steal and around the back move for a bucket. Celtics come back to tie. TA doing a great job on Bryant. Pierce hitting threes like crazy. The Celtics look in sync and Rondo is controlling the game.  This has been the Celtics best quarter of the season.

Halftime thoughts: Rondo is the best player on the floor. He is dictating the pace of the game and no one can stay in front of him. Pierce is continuing his torrid shooting from three.  Tony Allen is having by far the best half of his career. He has played great D on Kobe and scored at will. The late run at the end troubles me. Let's hope we don't have our usual 3rd quarter drought and blow them out of the water in the 2nd half.

3rd Quarter: KG can't guard Bynum. Rondo is just moving faster than everyone else. Two straight fouls on Garnett and Perkins were huge. Not the same energy as the second quarter.  Rondo sick reverse layup, might be the most entertaining player to watch in the league. Perkins needs to do less complaining and stick to basketball.  Garnett tries to be too fancy sometimes with his passes. Kobe is getting shut down, Lebron is way harder to cover. Lakers have no bench besides Odom. It was a decent quarter but we need to play better to close it out.

4th Quarter: BEAT L.A chant starts and Eddie House hits a 3 on queue.  Got lucky on the out of bounds call, but I'll take it. Rondo needs to get back on the court, they have no flow without him. Ray looks lost out there and not confident. Big 3 by Sheed, then of course he shoots another one right after. Bad call as that definitely hit the rim, makes up for the out of bounds call earlier. Big shot by Garnett. Kobe is getting shut down. Very nervous right now. We got lucky on another call, but great rebounding effort by Perk. Another lucky break when Ray got bailed out on that shot. Damn, huge foul on Pierce. Kobe hits the game winner with 7 seconds left. Ray has a good look, but shot doesn't fall.

Final Thoughts: Wow, what else is there to really say?  The good news is we've had a great opportunity to beat two of the best teams in the league, but have not been able to close it out.  Ray Allen and Rasheed Wallace didn't show up to play tonight and that was the ball game.

Defensively we did a great job on Kobe and that last shot was unguardable.  Bynum impressed me a lot, but other than Odom they don't have any bench. Lakers don't utilize Pau enough which I'm thankful for. Rondo was the best player on the court tonight as he usually is.

Kobe is much easier to guard than Lebron despite the game winner.  Ugh, very, very tough loss but overall the Celtics played well and just didn't make the plays at the end. Kudos to TA for having a hell of a game off the bench and playing some great defense on Kobe.  Sorry for the ridiculously long blog but it is Celtics/Lakers, what do you expect? Have a great night.