Wednesday’s NBA Playoff Match Ups

(Magic @ Celtics Game 2, Rockets @ Lakers Game 2)

The second round has officially begun and there have already been some upsets game one of two of the four series.

Coming into round two the Boston Celtics were tired, bruised and seemingly had no time to take a breath from their unbelievable seven game series against the Chicago Bulls. Even though the Celtics were able to overcome a talented young and motivated Bulls team it is obvious that historic series may have taken its toll as Boston came out flat against a rested Orlando Magic team in game one.

The Los Angeles Lakers had somewhat of the opposite effect coming off of too much rest before heading into their second round match up with the defensive minded Houston Rockets. Yao Ming and company came into game one in LA motivated and ready to play against the favorite to win it all and where able to snatch home court advantage away from the Lakers by going up 1-0 in their series.

It was painfully obvious in game one of this series that the Boston Celtics are going to have to make some serious adjustments on both offense and defense to be able to compete with Dwight Howard and company in seven games.

Rajon Rondo was a key factor in the loss to the Magic due to the fact he just couldn’t get going like he did the Bulls series. Ray Allen also struggled shooting the basketball which left only Paul Pierce picking up the slack.

The Magic got off to a huge double digit lead for the majority of the game, but that didn’t last in the fourth quarter as the Celtics started to come back and trim the deficit to single digits.

Orlando was able to hold the lead and keep Pierce at bay, but Boston did expose the Magic’s weakness to not be able to hold leads and live and die by the three point shot.

I fully expect the Celtics to come out in game two and beat the Magic by a convincing margin.

I wasn’t all that surprised that the Magic were able to upset the Celtics in game one after they were taken the distance against the Bulls, but I was definitely surprised to see the Rockets dominate the Lakers in Los Angeles in the first game of their second round series.

Kobe Bryant couldn’t hit a shot, Pau Gasol was pretty much non existent and both Yao Ming and Ron Artest were on their game! I still believe the Lakers will win this series, but it will be a challenge compared to the Utah Jazz series in the first round.

The key for the Lakers is stopping Yao in the paint and getting Kobe Bryant going offensively. Kobe scoring the basketball is never a problem for long, but if he keeps playing the way he did in game one the Lakers championship hopes are over.

The Lakers should comeback in game two with a vengeance and win by a convincing margin. As long as Kobe and company don’t live and die by the three and find a way to contain Yao in the paint they should win game two and tie up the series at one a piece.

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