Celts in tight squeeze

Ainge draws on experience

CHICAGO — If the Celtics are in need of inspiration as they head into this evening’s affair with the Bulls down 2-0, they need look no further than another No. 1 seed that dropped the first two games on its home floor to a No. 8 and lived to tell about it.

The 1992-93 Phoenix Suns overcame such a deficit against the Lakers, sweeping the rest of the best-of-five series and making it all the way to the NBA Finals.

But while Charles Barkley isn’t walking through that United Center door tonight, Danny Ainge is. True, in the words of Rick Pitino, Danny will be gray and old, but the Celtics president of basketball operations can speak from experience on how a club can extricate itself from such an abyss.

Ainge came off the Phoenix bench and hit 6-of-9 3-pointers over the last three games, and he was a key reserve in the Suns’ run to a six-game Finals loss to the Bulls.

He’s shared that experience with his Celtics players and coaches over the last couple of days. And he sees some parallels, though Phoenix was a much bigger favorite in its first-round series after rolling up 62 wins, 23 more than LA, which was running on the last fumes of its 1980s greatness.

“I remember that the Lakers had James Worthy and Byron Scott,” Ainge said. “They had guys that were used to winning — not unlike the situation we’re facing right now. The Bulls have Dwyane Wade and (Rajon Rondo), guys who’ve won championships and know how to play at this time of the year. And Jimmy Butler is a star.

“But when I look back to our Suns team, we had really good players. We had Charles and KJ (Kevin Johnson) and Dan Majerle. But we had a lot of expectation on us, and I just remember that we were playing tight. We were not playing loose.

“Then at halftime of Game 3, it was a close game and we were on the verge of elimination because it was a five-game series. This is after losing the two at home. Then (Suns coach) Paul Westphal walks in and says, ‘Does anybody have any good jokes?’ So then for the next 10 minutes, we just told jokes. Then we went out, got that game, took Game 4 and went back to Phoenix, won that one and ended up going to the Finals.”

There is no laughing matter for the Celtics, particularly in light of Isaiah Thomas losing his sister in an automobile accident last Saturday. But Ainge does believe that, while the Bulls have exposed some weaknesses that have been evident all season (rebounding, a consistent scoring complement for Thomas), a lot of the Celtics problem exists between the players’ ears.

“The moral of the story is that sometimes it’s not that your offense isn’t good or you’re not playing hard enough on defense or you’re not making as good of decisions as you did in the regular season,” said Ainge on the Phoenix ’93 lesson. “A lot of it is you’re just playing tight. And obviously Chicago is a good team. I mean, they beat Cleveland four times this year, and obviously they’re playing very free right now. Everyone on their team is loose, and shooting can be contagious, just like hitting in baseball can be. They’re shooting well, and they deserve a lot of credit. And we are not playing our best basketball.

“But they’re playing well. They’re good. And then when you add that to our guys trying to do too much, you’re not playing your game.”

And while Ainge can directly draw upon his Suns experience, there are more recent examples of top seeds not playing up to expectations — examples that strike close to home.

“When you think about it, that’s how we were in Atlanta in ’08,” said Ainge of the 2007-08 Celtics that he built. “We had to sweat out that series, and we were clearly the better team that would go on to win a championship.”

The Celts were pushed to seven games by the Hawks, who had finished 29 games behind them in the East. The C’s won by 34 in the Garden in Game 7, but they had been shaken and stirred as they didn’t win a road game in the series.

“That was a tough battle,” said Ainge. “We could not make a shot. We were not ourselves in Atlanta. And they were playing free and easy with no expectations, and we had the weight of the world on us. We didn’t really hit our stride until later. But it happens. You have to be good, but you have to be loose enough, too.”

The Celtics will try to loosen up tonight against the Bulls. But if they can’t find their stride, they will be facing elimination here Sunday.