Sam Smith

So they did it. The Boston Celtics won the 2008 NBA title, the first championship for the legendary franchise since 1986, their 17th overall and ….

Hey! What's all that noise back there! Can't you see I’m trying to write a great story about this Celtics championship. What? Oh. You're kidding. Really? The Lakers won Game 5 of the NBA Finals in Los Angeles on Sunday, narrowing the series to 3-2 Boston?

Paul Pierce scored 38 points, but he was held off along with the Celtics by Kobe Byant with 25, Lamar "Sleepy" Odom with 20 points and 11 rebounds and Pau "Softy" Gasol with 19 points and 13 rebounds?

I guess it's true because everyone is saying it, but this is just a matter of time now. If you saw Game 5 — heck if you've seen any of the five games in this NBA championship series — you know Vladimir Radmanovic may be doing more damage to the NBA than Tim Donaghy and that the Celtics have been the better team and are going to win this series.

"I know I didn't want to see the Celtics celebrating in my home floor with champagne and all that crap," said Gasol, who peeled off his soft as down feather reputation for one game and muscled Kevin Garnett to the basket and into game-long foul trouble. "I definitely didn't want to see that. We played well. We didn't play our best game, but we played our hearts out."

The Lakers did, even if the hearts of the home fans seemed to stop beating again as after losing Game 4 after running up a 24-point lead, this time the Lakers looked like they'd lose Game 5 and the series after bolting out to an early 19-point lead.

But you also got the feeling that after the embarrassment of blowing the biggest lead in Finals history, the Lakers wanted to summon up one more effort to at least make the series appear competitive.

Better to leave town on your own.

"Well, they just played harder," Lakers coach Phil Jackson said of his team. "They played harder than the Celtics consistently for the game, and I think that was a big key in the ballgame. They scrapped out rebounds. We won the rebound situation. It was a very close game statistically, though, but possessions were important. I think we had more shots than they did. Those are the type of things that win games that are this close."

Video   Effort key as Lakers win Game 5 June 16: Kobe happy with where Lakers are at while Kevin Garnett admits he played "like garbage" as L.A. forced a Game 6 in Boston. NBC Sports

It was close again despite still another Lakers first quarter barrage in taking a 39-22 lead. No big deal. The Lakers led by 21 after one quarter Thursday. You know, the Celtics felt they had them where they wanted them. This time, unlike in Game 4, the Celtics virtually erased the lead immediately and cut the Lakers lead to 55-52 at halftime.

"I went in at halftime and said, 'Thank God we don't have a lead,'" Jackson joked. "It's important we don't have something like that because we just don't know what to do with it anyway, and they were able to come out and give it up right off the bat, but scrap back."

But Jackson's gamble with his reserves at the start of the second quarter backfired, and the Lakers lost all the momentum and rhythm they'd used to dominate early. Jackson, ever optimistic, talked after the game about the travel day Monday and another game Tuesday.

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Uh, Phil, you were down 3-1.

Reserves tend to play better at home and poorly on the road, though the Celtics bench has been good both places, another reason they've had the edge. So Jackson took a shot with Chris Mihm (who hadn't played since the regular season and now we know why), Jordan Farmar, Sasha Vujacic, Trevor Ariza and Luke Walton. It was a disaster as Pierce drove and scored at will and put the Lakers into the foul bonus less than four minutes into the quarter. Jackson rushed his regulars back and it was all the Lakers could do to cling to a lead at halftime.

Game on.

"First quarter we could have packed up the tent," said Celtics coach Doc Rivers. "Fourth quarter we were down 10, could have packed up the tent. We're going to keep fighting. That's who we've been all year."

The Lakers stuck early to the strategy they'd used in playing Bryant on Rajon Rondo so Bryant could roam on defense and disrupt the Celtics. Rivers had seen enough when Rondo drove uncontested for a layup and with Radmanovic at the basket but not contesting as would be his style against Pierce all game, Rondo inexplicably threw back to Pierce for a three. Rondo played just 15 minutes and starting center Kendrick Perkins, who promised afterward he'd play in Game 6, was in street clothes with a shoulder injury.

"Rondo is just not playing well right now," acknowledged Rivers. "We still believe in him. They're doing a nice job to start games with Kobe guarding him and roaming, and the ball is ending up in his hands. And what we're trying to get him to do is just be aggressive to the basket. Early in the game he had a lay up, I think, that he could have taken, and he's looking to be a passer. He's got to look to make more plays and be aggressive to the basket."

Video   Not impressed June 16: Christopher Russo is not crazy about the Lakers' performance and says Celtics will win the NBA Finals. NBC Sports

So the Celtics went to their smaller lineup with James Posey and Eddie House and used P.J. Brown more with Perkins out when Odom and Gasol finally used their size advantage to rebound. That lineup has proven more effectively offensively and probably was the right one again Sunday as it brought the Celtics back from the big deficit with Posey again hitting a late big three.

But without Rondo the Celtics don't handle the ball well, and it forced Pierce into being both the ball handler, distributor and scorer. He was terrific once again and looks like the runaway MVP unless the Lakers stage some sort of improbable comeback.

"A lot of things can happen," Jackson said. "We're young enough and dumb enough to be able to do this."

Certainly dumb enough often it would seem.

Though the Lakers won, they were about to let the Celtics steal another.

Their defense on the pick and roll was atrocious as they failed to trap, and when Bryant would get buried in a screen, lanes to the basket opened likes Moses in the Red Sea. Radmanovic inexplicably played up on Pierce, who waltzed by him to the basket or into easy fouls. The triangle offense was often ineffective again with Gasol and Odom not spacing well because they don't seem to want to take jumpers, Gasol passing up several at the free throw line and Radmanovic taking bad, forced shots.

But this time Jackson made the adjustments which mattered and the Lakers made just enough plays to survive.

Jackson finally ditched Radmanovic at small forward and went with a three-guard lineup with Farmar, Bryant and Derek Fisher, and Bryant made two big steals from Pierce, who didn't sit out until the last few seconds of the game with the Celtics fouling.

"We were getting beat on a Pierce-Garnett screen roll that got higher and higher as they got up towards half court," said Jackson. "They extended our defense and Pierce was able to break us down, we tried to do something different and this time Kobe was available and capable of getting that steal."

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