Magic coach Stan Van Gundy vowed before Friday’s game with the Celtics that he would try to be less negative.

“I’m going to be be more constructive,” Van Gundy said. “I’m not Little Mary Sunshine, but I’m going to work on being less negative. Be more constructive.”

Van Gundy is one the league’s most direct coaches in his dealings with the media, and also one of the most sarcastic. Not surprisingly, that has rubbed some of his players the wrong way over the years. Van Gundy said he would try to work on it after a meeting with star center, Dwight Howard, but he did want to clear up what he said was a misconception about the nature of the sit-down.

“Dwight didn’t come to me about anything,” Van Gundy said. “I went to Dwight and said, ‘What’s going on?’ Why are we not playing with enthusiasm?”

Van Gundy went on to say that Howard mentioned a few things (expectations, injuries) before getting around to Van Gundy being too negative in his assessment of the team.

“It’s not as big a deal as it’s been reported,” Van Gundy said. “I thought it was done in a positive way.”

Van Gundy and Howard had a public disagreement after Game 2 of the Celtics-Magic series last season when Howard campaigned for more touches.

Howard said everything was copacetic between the team and the coach. “I just told him that we need to see more positive than negative.”

Asked for his reaction, Doc Rivers said, “His coaching style is just fine, honestly.” A few minutes before Rasheed Wallace came by and good-naturedly yelled that he and the group of reporters huddled around him were a fire hazard, which prompted Rivers to add, “On this team it’s the opposite. I go to Rasheed and say, ‘Can you be calmer?’”

Celtics coach Doc Rivers joined Dennis & Callahan for his weekly chat, and the hosts asked him about his coaching style, how he deals with different players and whether he would go for the win or the tie if he was down by two points. (Click here for complete audio interview.)

Coaches have been in the news lately. As a jumping-off point, do you consider yourself a player’s coach?

Rivers: I’ve heard that for years — what’s a player’s coach? I don’t know if there is such a thing, honestly. There’s coaches who have great relationships with their players, there are those who don’t, but I don’t think that’s what makes them a player’s coach or not. I think the respect factor is huge. If you have respect in the locker room with your players and vice versa then I guess that makes you a player’s coach.

Do you ever toss a table, break a chalkboard or scream bloody murder?

I scream bloody murder. I’ve never been a chalkboard puncher, but I’ve done things where I’ve lost my temper. But I don’t think those are things you can do very often because eventually it will not work. But you have to be demanding. You have to demand a standard, which is what we call it in our locker room. We set a standard. I demand that standard. That’s the part you have to get your players to buy into.

What are the things you live by to set that standard?

The number one thing with me is you have to remain agenda free. It has to be about team and it has to be about winning. If you have those two things and they believe that and it has to be true then they will follow you. It’s not about a star. It’s not about anything else but winning, and you tell them that up front. That doesn’t mean the decisions you make are always right. When you make a decision and it’s always about what’s good for the team then it’s very difficult for someone to question you on that.

That doesn’t mean that we can’t do something different and that may be true. I tell my players all the time, I’m not going to do right all the time, but I know if you do right all the time it will still work. Read the rest of this entry »

Danny Ainge joined the guys on The Big Show to talk about the rumored three-way trade that was just a rumor, the media’s incessant rumor-mongering and his team’s recent lack of consistency (CLICK HERE for complete audio interview). There’s also some good Stephon Marbury talk later on. [Edited in spots for clarity].

Lets’ get right to it, right off the bat. We keep hearing about this three-team deal, lay it on us, what’s going on?

Ainge: We have nothing going on.

Are you telling me that the media making this stuff up?

In the media there are people who are more concerned with breaking news then they are with writing truth and writing real history. It’s the competition of who breaks the story first, and I have a feeling there’s people with motives that are trying to get their player traded from another team. That’s why this story gets out.

Were there any conversations with any of these teams at all?

No.

You haven’t had any conversations with any of these teams?

No.

So, is it possible that an agent with a media person would have their own reason for doing it?

I think that happens a lot. There’s some person who will call some person in the business to get their input. That input spreads from person to person to the next thing you know a story comes out and there’s no validity to it. There’s so much of that that goes on. I spend so much of my time talking to reporters that are calling to see if this stuff is true.

Do you have to deal with the agents and players on the other side when something like this comes out?

That’s the easier part. Players get it. They understand the business. I’ve been very honest with my players. I’ll answer any question they have to see if there’s any validity to any of the rumors. It’s not just our team. There’s things that I read almost daily that I know for a fact aren’t true. Read the rest of this entry »

WALTHAM – The Celtics conducted an open practice session for one of their sponsors Monday, which allowed the media a window into their mostly closed off world. NBA teams have been conducting practices in private for several years now, usually allowing the last 20-30 minutes to be open for viewing for the press.

That tends to mean a whole lot of watching guys take free throws, but with the open session we were able to see how hard they work on defense, and how loud and vocal the practices tend to be. The Celtics worked a lot on halfcourt situations and it had the same intensity as a regular game.

Paul Pierce (bruised left knee) sat out the session. Doc Rivers said that he shouldn’t have let Pierce play on Saturday against Indiana, but that he let Pierce talk him into it. Pierce tried to sneak on to the court Monday, but Rivers shut him down.

“He’s not going to practice today or tomorrow,”Rivers said. “I told him that after the game. He tried to get on the floor at the beginning, I told him no. he doesn’t miss practices. The only way you can get him to miss is to force him.”

Tony Allen did take part in his first practice since training camp, but he’s unlikely to see game action, unless as Rivers said, “We need him.”

After the session there was ample talk about what’s been going wrong the last two games, and it starts with the pick and roll defense.

“Our pick and roll coverage is the main thread,” Rivers said. “It’s been inconsistent. It’s two guys not just the guy on the ball. It’s the guy guarding the ball who sets the pick. And then dribble penetration. Some of our defensive sets have been very good and then with five seconds left on the clock the guy dribbling the ball gets all the way to the basket and that’s not just the guy guarding the ball.”

Rivers also said that he thought fatigue was a factor. He blamed himself for working his team too hard during practice last Thursday before a set of back-to-back games. “I made a mistake on Thursday,” Rivers said. “We went way too hard in practice. I thought it carried over to our back to back on Thursday and Friday. I thought we could get away with it, and I was wrong.” Read the rest of this entry »

Celtics coach Doc Rivers joined Dennis & Callahan to talk about Wednesday night’s win over Utah, the importance of practice and what he looks for in the box score.

At what point in a game like Wednesday night do you and the coaching staff start smoking the Red Auerbach cigar?

Rivers: A lot of times the young guys get on the floor and you’re trying to help them improve. There may be a point in a season where you need a Lester Hudson on the floor. So you never stop [coaching]

What about when Kevin Garnett goes up on two defenders on an alley-oop, in a blowout, do you hold your breath like everyone else? Do you spend a lot of time thinking about health?

No I don’t. I can’t worry about that. They’re healthy. Everyone’s healthy. Kevin’s 100 percent healthy and his game’s just going to keep getting better. So you don’t worry about that. You just worry about minutes and the minutes have been great this year. That’s the only thing you actually have any [control over], along with the gameplan.

What is it that you miss by not practicing. Is it physical? Is it mental?

I think you have slippage. When you play a lot of games and you don’t have a lot of time to adjust to some of the things that you’re slipping in, it just goes further. The discipline in that is execution offensively and defensively.

We did it at both ends last night, and that’s clearly a couple of things. Number one, they’re more rested and that’s both physically and mentally. But the most important thing is their execution. When you play eight games in 12 days you don’t have time to work on things and you lose a lot. You could see it in that game last night. Early on, one of my assistants, Kevin Eastman said, ‘It’s amazing what a couple of practices can do.’ Read the rest of this entry »

Rasheed Wallace went 0-for-the-weekend on 3-pointers, but Doc Rivers doesn't mind Wallace's shot selection. (AP)

WALTHAM — The infamous stretch of eight games in 12 days is behind the Celtics, who now have a little bit of time to tighten the things that began to get away from them over the weekend.

“Defense and offense, we were slipping in both areas,” Doc Rivers said after a two-hour session Monday. “Defensively, our transition defense was starting to struggle. Our pick-and-roll defense was really slipping. That’s why you need practices. We still have new guys, down the stretch of games that’s when it really shows.”

A popular topic of conversation was the number of 3-pointers the Celtics have taken so far this season. Through eight games the C’s have taken 154 3-pointers, and Rivers suggested after the loss to Phoenix that he thought his team was searching for the 3-point line instead of attacking the middle of the Suns defense, where the Celtics had so much success.

Rivers, though, said several times that he didn’t mind the amount of 3’s his team was hoisting and he clarified the remarks he made at the end of the Phoenix game.

“I don’t mind the amount of 3’s we’re taking at all,” Rivers said. “What I don’t want is at the end of the game, is settling for them. I think we thought that we needed 3’s to get back in the game and we didn’t. We just needed to play. As far as the amount of 3’s we’re taking, I’m fine with that. They’re good shots for us.”

One player in particular has stood out for his willingness to shoot the long ball: Rasheed Wallace. Wallace has shot 75 times this season, and 50 of his attempts have been from beyond the arc, which even for him is a little much — particularly because he went 0-for-10 against Phoenix and New Jersey. Still, Rivers insisted that there was nothing wrong with Wallace’s role.

“I have no problem with it,” Rivers said. “We’re 7-1 and Rasheed is a big reason for that. Even when he misses, he’s taking a [center] and making them stand out by the 3-point line when Paul [Pierce] and Ray [Allen] are working down low, or Kevin [Garnett] or [Kendrick Perkins] or someone else. Obviously, we want to keep mixing it up and get him on the post and get Kevin on the post. His shooting is a big factor for us.”

A couple of things that are worth pointing out here:

1. The Celtics are averaging 19.3 3-point attempts per game, which ranks 12th in the NBA. In other words, the high volume of 3-point attempts is a league-wide trend.

2. The Celtics are making the 3’s at a rate of of just over 40 percent, which ranks fourth in the NBA.

3. They are holding teams to 32 percent shooting from 3-point range, which is tied for seventh.

So, the Celtics are making good use of the 3-point line, both offensively and defensively. There is ample evidence that suggests that teams that shoot more 3-pointers, and shoot them better, will win most of their games.

“I know this is a big deal all of a sudden here about 3-point attempts,” Rivers said.  “I’m not upset at all. I like what we’re doing. We’re causing teams miserable problems because we’re spreading the floor.”

NOTES: Bill Walker practiced for the first time since undergoing knee surgery, while Brian Scalabrine sat out the sessions. Scalabrine was a DNP on Friday because of back spasms, but he suited up on Saturday while Marquis Daniels was away tending to a personal matter.

Walker still has a ways to go before he can get a chance at cracking the end of the rotation, but it does appear that his rehab is right on schedule, which is a good sign for the second-year forward, who has flashed interesting potential in his limited minutes.

“We didn’t hold him back at all,” Rivers said. “He was fine. I don’t know what his schedule was. I’m assuming it’s about on schedule because [trainer] Eddie [Lacerte] told me a week ago this is the day he’s going to practice.”

This was a classic trap game for the Celtics. On the second day of a back-to-back and facing their eighth game in 12 days to open the season, this was an obvious letdown game for them on the calendar.

The Nets were also missing seven players due to a variety of injuries, including the swine flu for Chris Douglas-Roberts, and the Izod Center was half-empty. Add that all up and you have a recipe for a potential disaster.

The Celtics almost fell into the trap, but were able to put it together in the fourth quarter in an 86-76 victory, which gives them the best record in the NBA at 7-1.

Player of the game: Paul Pierce. Until the fourth quarter Pierce and Rajon Rondo were the only two Celtics doing anything offensively. Rondo was able to get his game going with steals on the defensive end, but Pierce got it done in the halfcourt. He also stepped in front of a rampaging Brook Lopez and took a charge.

It wasn’t a vintage Pierce game, but 16 points and seven assists looked pretty sweet in what was an otherwise ugly boxscore.

Turning point: The Celtics trailed by two points entering the fourth quarter and Pierce was on the bench with foul trouble. They needed someone to step up and make a shot and that someone was Brian Scalabrine, who knocked down two to give them a lead they never relinquished.

Scalabrine missed Friday night’s game with Phoenix because of back trouble, but the Celtics needed him to give it a go without Marquis Daniels (personal reasons) in the lineup.

* The Nets had just eight healthy players available for the game, which is the NBA minimum. They are without Courtney Lee, Devin Harris, Keyon Dolling, Jarvis Hayes, Yi Jianlin, Tony Battie and Chris Douglas-Roberts.

* With Daniels out, JR Giddens had a chance to play some meaningful minutes. Giddens lasted only two minutes before getting pulled.

* Ray Allen was on his way to another bad shooting night, but he turned it on in the fourth quarter making four straight shots.

* Rasheed Wallace missed all four of his 3-pointers and he is now 0-for-10 from distance in his last two games. But unlike Friday night’s game with Phoenix, he also went down into the post where he was able to operate effectively. He also came up with a handful of big defensive plays in the fourth quarter.