I thought the Celtics were going to let that one slip away, but Pierce saved their butts in the fourth quarter with 11 points. (Interesting stat from the story I linked above: Pierce led the NBA in fourth-quarter points with 552. That’s pretty incredible, considering the competition: Garnett, Bryant, et. al.) In total, Pierce had 25 and Walker had 11, as compared to Iverson’s 29.

Charles Barkley made a good point for once on TNT, which was that sometimes the game of basketball is very simple. The Celtics have two bona fide scoring machines and the Sixers only have one. As long as the Celtics play good enough defense to keep McKie, Snow or Coleman from being a huge factor on the offensive side of the ball, they’re good to go.

So defense is the difference, but as clutch as Pierce was in the fourth, the Celtics had a very balanced scoring attack for a change. McCarty, Pierce, Battie and Williams all scored in double figures. It would be very nice if the Celtics could go into Philly and complete the sweep on their home court. Then the Celtics could just sit back and wait for their second-round opponent. By the way, it was great to really hear the Boston crowd really getting into it. They must be elated to have the Celtics playing games that matter again.

I went to the Giants-Cubs game on Wednesday night. The game was delayed a half hour by rain and it was really chilly in the ballpark. The cold winds pierced me to the bone. It was worth it, though, to finally see the Cubs get some clutch hitting. Sure, Clement didn’t have a third great start in a row, but Borowski was marvelous in relief again. He pitched 2 1/3 innings, struck out five and got the win.

Most important, of course, was that the offense finally broke through for 10 runs. Even McGriff got in on the act with a crucial triple to bust the game open. Dusty Baker chose to walk Sosa to load the bases in the sixth inning and McGriff made him pay. The nearly worthless Delino DeShields struck out four times in the game. He’s versatile, though — he struck out swinging three times and looking the other time. But the one time DeShields did not strike out was in the sixth, when he walked to keep the inning alive.

The only bummer about the game was that Bonds did not play. I can’t plame Baker for that, though. The field was wet and it was really, really cold. Why risk aggravating Bonds’ hamstring injury?

And today, the Cubbies won a close one, again keyed by a timely hit — this time from DeShields! Heh. He’s still awful, and I hope the Cubs bring up Bobby Hill as soon as he’s ready, but it’s still nice to see him come up with a big hit. And so much for Lieber’s arm troubles. He went eight innings with only 79 pitches, and Bonds didn’t even reach base.

Should be an interesting matchup tomorrow between Wood and Odalis of the Dodgers. Maybe the Cubs just needed a kick in the ass to get their act together. And here’s the beauty part. While the Cubs are five games behind the Pirates, who are in first place, they are within a half game and a game, respectively, of the Astros and Cardinals. The Cubs are lucky that their terrible start did not put them in a huge hole. Now they have to make the most of that by doing what they need to do to win ballgames until Mueller, Hundley, Gordon, Farnsworth, et. al. come back.