Rondo not on point

BOSTON — Rajon Rondo's free throw floated wide of everything. It was as if he aimed for a spot three feet left from the backboard. The crowd groaned. He missed the second. The crowd groaned again.

That moment, which came at 2:15 in the third quarter, was the low point of a frustrating night for the Celtics point guard. He played well at times, but the performance lacked the same kind of consistency he displayed in the first round of the playoffs.

Rondo finished with 14 points, but only shot 2 of 12 from the floor. He seemed to be short-arming his attempts, hitting the front of the rim on several occasions. At one point in the third quarter, coach Doc Rivers pulled him aside.

"He tried to shoot that floater and missed it and I called him over and I said, 'Rondo, you're not playing with speed,'" Rivers said. "And I thought after that his speed became a factor. It's tough to make a floater when you're walking. He was trying to read the defense instead of playing with his instincts."

After scoring a single bucket in the first half, his play began to pick up. In the third quarter alone, he shot 10 of 12 from the line (one of his two misses was the bizarre air ball). His seven turnovers made it feel like an atypical performance, but Rondo nearly finished with a triple-double (14 points, 10 rebounds, 8 assists).

"I thought in the third quarter Rondo really set the tone with his defense and the way he pushed the ball," Celtics captain Paul Pierce said. "He really got us out on the break and we started getting consecutive stops. We allowed ourselves to get back in the ballgame." ¬

The Celtics outscored Orlando 54-41 in the second half, but couldn't quite complete a comeback that would've rivaled recent playoff victories over the Los Angeles Lakers (2008 NBA finals) and the New Jersey Nets (2002 Eastern Conference finals).

Still, Rondo, who had all three of his steals in the second half, earned the praise of Magic coach Stan Van Gundy.

"We could not handle Rajon Rondo's pressure," he said. "They had us flattened out totally offensively and they were just driving the ball."

Over the weekend, Rivers mentioned that Rondo wasn't feeling well. Illness was not, the coach said, a factor last night. Neither was fatigue, Rivers said. Rondo's second-half burst seemed to prove that hypothesis.

"His speed is power," Rivers said of Rondo, who averaged 19.4 points, 11.6 assists and 9.3 rebounds against the Bulls. "That allowed him to be a better player. I thought that changed the game for us, once he got it going."

But in the end, it wasn't quite enough from Rondo, especially after Boston trailed by 28 in the third quarter.

"We can't wait until we're down 25, 26 to wake up," Pierce said. "It's like a boxing match and you get hit with a hook and an upper cut and then you decide to fight. We can't do that. We've got to take the fight to them from the start."

Star burst short lived

For a few fleeting moments Stephon Marbury actually looked like the player Danny Ainge hoped he signed Feb. 27. The backup point guard scored all eight of his points (4 of 6) in the first half, but was never really heard from again.

He played a total of 8 1/2 minutes, all but six seconds of which came in the first half.

"He was terrific," Rivers said. "It was a tough call for a coach because you wanted to go back with him in the second half. But Rondo got it going then and we were playing with such speed that we just stayed with that group."

Even though he really didn't see the court in the second half, Marbury took a little bit of solace in the comeback.

"You can take some positives," he said. "We get our opportunity to watch film and see what we did in the second half. We have to build on it. It's a long series, it's seven games. I think for us we just have to continue to play with the mind set we played with in the second half."

Nerves of steel

As Boston whittled away Orlando's lead, a lot of the Magic players looked scared to shoot.

Mickael Pietrus was an exception. The 6-foot-6 swingman from France scored 17 points and went 3 of 7 from beyond the arc.

"It's tough when you put yourself in a hole against a team like that," Rivers said. "Eventually someone's going to make a shot. Unfortunately it was Pietrus a couple times that made huge shots for them."

King gets his crown

LeBron James was named NBA MVP yesterday.

"LeBron really deserved it and I'm happy for him," Rivers said. "He plays the game right. He not only is a great athlete, but he does the little things. You look at what he's been able to do in Cleveland, in leading that team, and you realize it was the right decision."

Magic forward Rashard Lewis agreed

SDLqKobe Bryant was obviously the runner-up but at the same time I think Kobe has a lot more supporting cast than LeBron does," he said. "The way he took that team to new heights from last year to this year...individually his numbers are unbelievable so I think it's well deserved for him."

Odds and ends

Boston College legend Doug Flutie, Patriots linebacker Adalius Thomas, Celtics greats John Havlicek and JoJo White were all in the house. ...

Fourteen years ago yesterday, the Celtics fell to the Magic 95-92 in the last basketball game at the Boston Garden. Sherman Douglas' 3-point attempt was blocked with 6.9 seconds left to prevent Boston from tying the game. The victory gave top-seeded Orlando, which made the only NBA finals appearance in franchise history that season, a 3-1 series win in the Eastern Conference quarterfinals.

Celts recap

Score: Orlando Magic 95, Boston Celtics 90

Attendance: 18,624

Stat of the game: Zero. The amount of free throws the Celtics attempted in the first half. They made 22 of 26 attempts in the second half, but it was too little, too late.

"When you shoot zero free throws for a half, that means your team is completely unaggressive," Celtics coach Doc Rivers said. "I mean, we settled for jump shots, we stood around. The second half we attacked, and that's the difference."

Hero: Nobody on the Magic seemed worthy of this title. Rashard Lewis did score a team-high 18 points but Orlando barely put Boston away after leading 65-37 in the third quarter. Orlando coach Stan Van Gundy didn't mince words.

"The last 16 minutes was a debacle," he said.

The Big Man rules the glass: Dwight Howard was relatively quiet offensively (16 points) but dominated the boards (22 rebounds).

Disappearing act: After a dynamite end to the Bulls series, Ray Allen struggled. He scored a paltry nine points on 2-of-12 shooting. Imagine if his 3-point attempt with 44 seconds remaining — Boston trailed 91-87 at that point — in the fourth didn't rim out. The C's might've completed the comeback.

Baby's not quite big enough: Glen "Big Baby" Davis played well on offense (12 points), but fouled out late (guarding Dwight Howard will do that.) He still took some positives from this one.

"I feel that we know we can win," he said. "We know we can beat these guys when we play Celtics basketball."

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