Rested Irving has pep in step
The Celtics were in possession of a 17-point lead as the third quarter’s midpoint neared. One more mortal wound could put Charlotte out of its misery.
Kyrie Irving had the ball. In other words, the prospects were good.
He drove at Kemba Walker, taking him to the elbow at the right edge of the free throw line. Walker stayed with him, so Irving stopped and did a quarter-turn back with a spin dribble. Then he up-faked and did another clockwise twist to the left.
Irving turned back as the 24-second clock was nearing its end and threw in a 20-foot fadeaway over the outstretched hand of Walker, who couldn’t have done any more without committing assault.
“That’s Kyrie,” said Walker after last night’s 134-106 wire-to-wire Celtics victory. “That’s Kyrie, man.
“He hit me with about a million moves in one, and he made a tough shot. That’s what this league’s all about, making tough shots. And he’s definitely one of the tough-shot makers. That’s nothing you can put your head down about. That’s a special play.”
Irving hit 13-of-18 shots and finished with 34 points in 25 minutes, but Walker was miles from shabby himself, making 9-of-13 from the floor and scoring 23 in the same amount of time. Each went 4-for-6 on 3’s.
“Kyrie’s a competitor. He’s a phenomenal player, man, and it’s fun to watch. It is. It’s fun to play against him,” Walker said. “I try to take some moves from him, and he always pulls something out every single game.”
Even more in the last three, in which Irving is averaging an even 30 points on 60.4 percent shooting overall (32-of-53) with a ridiculous 57.7 percent (15-of26) on 3-pointers.
Irving credited the better Celt pace, “and also just playing with an aggressive mindset — like I’ve been doing, but probably more of an emphasis on it from my end,” he said. “My being aggressive just creates a lot of opportunities for my teammates.”
The Celtics have averaged 118.5 points in their four games/wins since reconvening from the All-Star hiatus, and while others have certainly made large contributions to the revival, Irving is driving this train.
“He’s very locked in,” said coach Brad Stevens. “I thought he went into the break hurting a little bit for how we played. I think that that was a feeling shared by all of us on how our team performed in the last few days leading up to the break. And I thought that he hopefully had time to relax and kind of get away for a minute.
“But clearly when we came back (last) Wednesday, we were ready to go. And he was as locked in as anybody.”
The guy he replaced was known as The King of the Fourth. But in the last two games, Irving has played so well in the first three quarters that he has been The Man of Leisure in the Fourth.
All that was missing from his seat on the Celtics bench was an ottoman upon which to rest his feet. Perhaps a cannoli from the North End.
While the Celts’ first three wins coming out of the All-Star break were met with a “yeah, but” chorus because Detroit, New York and Memphis were less than stellar opposition, the Hornets, while still below C-level at 28-33, had been swimming toward the surface with five straight victories.
Irving immediately hit them in the gut with 16 points in 10 first quarter minutes. He hit 6-of-9 shots, including 2-of-3 treys.
He played just five minutes in the second inning, but still found time to bag 4-of-5 shots for eight more points.
After recess, Kyrie delivered the coup de grace. There were 10 more points in nine more minutes, and when he left the floor for the evening, there was a 98-74 Celtics lead that was every bit as insurmountable as it reads.
Irving could afford to take a break, which is something the Celtics hope will pay dividends a couple of months from now.
“Obviously the more time that we can get, that we can steal, the better,” said Stevens. “But we’re not going to play him 40 minutes a game anyway, so we’re going to manage this appropriately and do it the right way so that he feels as fresh as he can feel. He’s obviously a dynamic scorer regardless, but everybody is a little bit better when they’re fresher.”
And the Celtics are fresher because they’re playing a bit faster. They are moving the ball at a quicker tempo, which has given them the appearance of more energy 63 games into the season.
“I think that for the first few games (after the break) we’ve done a great job of responding,” Irving said. “And we just want to keep it up, because the season definitely doesn’t end tomorrow.”
If Kyrie Irving continues to play like this, it won’t end for quite a while.