Celtics forward is able to dominate Wizards By the time John Wall volunteered to take a shot at guarding Paul Pierce, the All-Star forward already had done his damage.
Even when he finally got Pierce to miss, the next time down the floor the ball rotated to Kevin Garnett, who pump-faked and charged through the lane uncontested for a backbreaking slam, forcing the Wizards to choke down another tough lesson with a 100-94 defeat in front of 15,818 at Verizon Center.
“Everybody just wanted to try different ways,” Wall said. “He was just scoring. … It’s tough to double team him because he can just pick you apart, and that’s what he did.”
No less than five different Wizards ran at Pierce, whose 34 points, 10 assists and eight rebounds made up for Rajon Rondo missing his second straight game with an injured right wrist and Ray Allen leaving in the second quarter with a jammed left ankle.
After Trevor Booker’s alley-oop finish tied the game at 75-75, Pierce scored 13 of Boston’s next 18 points, including the first 10 in a row, hitting a jumper over Jordan Crawford (12 points) for a 93-86 lead with 3:23 to play.
The Wizards (2-14) were hardly the pushover that the Celtics (6-9), who had lost six of their last seven games, had beaten on back-to-back nights in Washington and Boston earlier in the month. Wall (27 points, 10 rebounds, seven assists) had his second straight double-double and scored the Wizards’ last 10 points of the first half. JaVale McGee (13 points) roasted Jermaine O’Neal during a fight back from 15-point deficit in the third quarter.
With a monster one-handed slam in the first period, Andray Blatche (eight points, nine rebounds) put two straight games behind him in which he was fiercely booed. He struck a Heisman Trophy pose after his long outlet found Nick Young (19 points) for a fast-break dunk and a foul with 6:06 remaining in the game, though the Wizards had to settle for an 84-83 lead when Young got a technical for taunting.
But with the Celtics’ defense pushing the Wizards back to nearly halfcourt, Young missed two terrible 3-point attempts, the second falling short by six feet as Young was harassed into the first row.
“We go in there confident,” Young said. “We’ve just got to find a way to pull it out in the end. We’re playing as hard as we can. Even Dray came out and did what he did. You didn’t hear that many boos tonight.”
After his dunk made the score 95-90, Garnett (17 points) added another open jumper to make it 97-92. The Wizards gave up on consecutive rebounding opportunities, and Wizards coach Flip Saunders threw down his clipboard in frustration, though he was more measured afterward.
“Ten days ago, we weren’t competing at a high level,” Saunders said. “We’ve gotten to the point now where we’re competing at a high level. Now we’ve got to find a way to close out these games like we did close out against Oklahoma City.”
