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How in the world did the Celtics in 1990 lose to the Knicks in the playoffs?

Celtics were 52-30 that year while the Knicks were 45-37.


Mchale, Bird, Parish, Lewis and DJ all played 75+ games that year.


In the 1st round series the Celtics were up 2-0 and then lost 3 in a row including the last game of the series at home.

In that playoffs:

Bird averaged 24/9/9 on 44% with a PER of 21
Mchale averaged 22/9/3 on 61% with a PER of 20
Parish averaged 16/10/3 on 57% with a PER of 19
Lewis averaged 20/5/5 on 60% with a PER of 18
DJ averaged 14/3/6 on 48% with a PER of 12


For the Knicks Ewing averaged 28/10/3 on 52% with a PER of 25 and then Wilkins was the next highest scorer at 15/4/5 on 46% FG with a PER of 16.

Patrick Ewing was the ****.

I think maybe because the knicks played a much more physical game then the celtics did. Because if it was anything else i think the celtics would have swept them. That was Bird's last great season of his career also.

Ewing was the next big thing.

Larry Bird 33 years old
Kevin McHale 32 years old
Robert Parish 36 years old
Dennis Johnson 35 years old
Jim Paxson 32 years old
Reggie Lewis 24 years old (the youngest of the core)

Here's your answers..............they were old, bottom line end of discussion.

Bird just didn't want it with Ewing that series.

DEEP3CL wrote:Larry Bird 33 years old
Kevin McHale 32 years old
Robert Parish 36 years old
Dennis Johnson 35 years old
Jim Paxson 32 years old
Reggie Lewis 24 years old (the youngest of the core)

Here's your answers..............they were old, bottom line end of discussion.

Not when everyone was producing like they were and not when they were up 2-0.

Part of it was the Celtics were overconfident. The Knicks hadn't won a game in Boston Garden in like 6 years, and it was another 2 years after that playoff series that they won a regular season game in Boston.

Boston also outscored the Knicks by 3 pts, even though the Knicks won 3 games to 2, so the statistics should be pretty similar.

The Knicks had a 9 player rotation, so it's not surprising that Pat was the only KNick to score over 15 pts per game.

Ewing - C
Oak - solid PF
Kiki - could still shoot
Wilkins (personally, I didn't like his game, but he was the teams 2nd scorer)
Newman (Fun, quick scorer)
Mo Cheeks (old, but efficient)
Mark Jackson (didn't like beign Cheeks sub, but he was an OK player)
Trent Tucker (3 pt specialist)
Kenny Sky Walker (yucky #5 pick, but a decent 9th man)


The Celtics essentially had a 7 player rotation and Joe Klein was their 7th man.

The Knicks were younger, deeper, more physical, better rebounding and better 3 pt shooting, and with all that , some would still say they just got lucky and stole game 5. Nobody predicted the knicks to win the series. But, I think, it's not the biggest upset to ever happen in the playoffs. Denver over Seattle, GoldenState over Dallas. Stranger things have happened.

Because the Knicks out scored them.

Optms wrote:Because the Knicks out scored them.

That was Ewing before the injuries set in, and he was a monster back then. The Knicks were a young team on the rise, and they wanted to prove they belonged. It's much easier mentally to play as the underdog in a series. I think people forget just how good Ewing was when healthy. Also, the Celtics were old and didn't have the drive anymore. When you are a championship caliber team for so long you know what it feels like to be a championship team. The Celtics knew they were not a championship team so they didn't play with fire. They didn't have that swag anymore in the playoffs, and it showed in their destruction in that series.

The Knicks were simply younger, hungrier and meaner.