LOS ANGELES (AP) -Those old guys ran out of gas just short of the finish line.
The Boston Celtics nearly pulled off an improbable championship, leading most of the way against the Los Angeles Lakers in Game 7 of the NBA finals on Thursday night before losing 83-79.
They wasted a superb defensive effort when their offense stalled midway through the fourth quarter. Boston went without a field goal for nearly five minutes, a decisive stretch when Los Angeles grabbed control.
It was nearly an 18th title for the league’s most decorated team, and perhaps its most unlikely. The Celtics were the No. 4 seed in the Eastern Conference after playing .500 ball over the second half of the season and were dismissed as too old to compete for a championship.
They finally looked their age Thursday night. Ray Allen’s jumper, one of the prettiest and most reliable in the NBA, was flat all night in a 3-for-14 performance.
er of the aging Big Three, scored 17 points but managed only three rebounds and couldn’t keep Pau Gasol off the backboards.
Pierce and Garnett both bent over with hands on shorts in the fourth quarter, usually a sign of fatigue. A more recognizable sign: Rasheed Wallace, another old guy who was forced to start because of Kendrick Perkins’ knee injury, had to throw his hand up to ask out of the game when he became winded in the second half.
The Celtics led by 13 in the second half with an efficient offense and an even better defense that was frustrating Kobe Bryant. That’s what Boston did to get past LeBron James and Cleveland, then defending East champion Orlando in the previous two rounds.
But all those games perhaps took their toll on the Celtics, who simply didn’t have the energy down the stretch. They were outrebounded 53-40 and couldn’t leap to corral the most important rebound of the game, which Gasol grabbed to retain possession with the Lakers up three and 30 seconds to go.
It was a great run for the Celtics. They just didn’t have the legs to finish it.
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