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Celtics President Danny Ainge: "I'm Disappointed"
Celtics Leader Disappointed but Planning Ahead
"I'm disappointed," said Ainge, whose team was eliminated from the playoffs by the Heat on Wednesday. "I'm disappointed in how we played the last 20 games of the regular season. I thought we should have had home-court advantage through the playoffs.
"I feel like we should be ahead 3-2 [in the Miami series] instead of going home.
"The last two games we played better than they did. But, as everyone knows, we gave it away in Game 4, and in Game 5 we outplayed them for 44 minutes and then fell apart. It happens. I've got to give Miami credit. Those guys made some tough, tough shots.
"But I felt the quality of shots we missed were so much better than the quality of shots they made."
The Big 3 of the Celtics (Paul Pierce, Ray Allen, and Kevin Garnett) failed to deliver during the final minutes of their Game 5 loss, causing some to wonder whether the 30-something-year-olds that make up the Boston Big 3 are just too old to compete with the younger stars in the NBA today.
Ainge seems decidedly un-concerned with the ages of his Big 3 and hopes to build a roster around them for next season.
"I don't know what happened," said Ainge about the Big 3's failure to close out the final minutes of their crucial games 4 and 5. "We had point-blank shots. It's not all fatigue. Kevin [Garnett] had about a 20-minute rest in between the third and the fourth quarter. Paul [Pierce] had all sorts of rest because he was in foul trouble.
"Our guys are capable of winning games like that. Our guys of capable of hitting shots like that. But we missed them, and I don't think [Miami's] defense was the reason."
But Ainge doesn't want to get ahead of himself. With a potential lockout for the next NBA season, no one can really say what the future holds.
"None of us know what will happen in this new world of basketball," said Ainge. "Will the rules be the same? Will they be different? We have to wait and see."
(Sources: ESPN.com)
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