Turn back the clock 25 years and it might have been Phil Jackson or Pat Riley muttering the words Stan Van Gundy used Wednesday to explain a painful loss at The Palace.
"We could not – at all – contain Isaiah Thomas. We just couldn't contain him – at all. We just could not keep him out of the paint. We couldn't stop him one on one, we couldn't stop him on pick and rolls. He was around our big guys even when we tried to trap him. We could not contain him."
Of course, the other Isiah Thomas had 4 more inches and one less "a" in his first name than the one who lit up the Pistons for 34 points – and, in the process, eliminated them from the playoffs – in Wednesday's 113-103 decision.
And, yes, he owes his name to the Pistons Hall of Famer. The father of Boston's Thomas, a trade-deadline acquisition that has the Celtics poised to make the playoffs, was a Lakers fan during the Bad Boys era and made a bet with a buddy on the outcome of the 1989 NBA Finals. If the Pistons won, he'd have to name his on-the-way infant after the Pistons superstar. His mother accepted that outcome, but insisted on the Biblical spelling.
Thomas put on a scoring display of near-Biblical proportions for Boston, getting those 34 points off the bench in less than 30 minutes and requiring only 17 shots to get there. Of course, it helped that he made 10 of 11 free throws, leading Boston to a whopping 34-10 disparity in attempts at the line.
The point guard the Pistons obtained at the trade deadline, Reggie Jackson, almost choked when I asked him what that lopsided 34-10 total told him about the game.
"They had three people make as many free throws as our team made collectively," he said, scanning the final box score. "Two guys who shot almost as many as our whole team. So they got to the line a lot more than we did. Thirty-four to 10. I can't explain it. We like free throws, too. We attack, too."
Greg Monroe returned to the lineup after missing three weeks and 11 games with a knee injury and didn't skip a beat, scoring 19 points to go with 10 rebounds in 31 minutes – a few more than Van Gundy anticipated using him. He, like Jackson, could barely contain his incredulity at the parade to Boston's line and the lack of activity at the opposite end.
"I think guys were attacking," he said. "I can't remember every play. There was definitely a big disparity. I guess we do have to be more aggressive – I guess. That's basically it."
Van Gundy, likewise, seemed to wonder how the 34-10 edge came about without directly implicating the officials.
"We've got to find a way to get to the line a little bit more," he said. "To have 48 shots in the paint and have a lot of other drives in there where we're deep and it's turnovers and you only get to the line 10 times, we're going to have to look at that and try to get to the line more than we did tonight."
When the Pistons had Jackson and Monroe on the floor, in particular, they were good. They established an early lead – before Boston closed the first quarter with an 18-0 run – and they led comebacks from double digits in each half. Jackson fueled a 16-4 third-quarter run that pulled the Pistons within one, but Boston finished the quarter – with Jackson on the bench for most of it – on a 19-2 surge.
Thomas was the driving force for Boston's bench with his 34 points, but even if you took Thomas away the Celtics got 39 other bench points. The Pistons got major contributions from Jodie Meeks (4 of 4, 13 points) and Tayshaun Prince (7 of 8, 15 points), but otherwise were outscored 73-31. Jae Crowder scored 17 for the Celtics and made 9 of 9 foul shots and Kelly Olynyk added a dozen.
So a 73-31 bench edge, a 33-6 advantage at the line and a 26-10 cushion in points off turnovers overwhelmed a very impressive offensive game for the Pistons. They shot .536 and saw big numbers for Jackson (21 points, 15 assists) and Andre Drummond (22 points, 14 rebounds) in addition to Monroe.
"It was Isaiah Thomas, it was 34-10 in free throws – you get outscored by 27 at the line, it's going to be tough to win – and 19 turnovers. That's the game to me," Van Gundy said. "Those are the three things. And their bench outscored us by a ton, mainly because of (Thomas), but Crowder and Olynyk were good, too. We were fine against their starters, but when they brought Isaiah into the game, we just got crushed."
Riley and Jackson might have said the same thing 25 years ago.
Two statistical items of note from the game: The playoff elimination means a Van Gundy-coached team will sit out the postseason for the first time in his eight full years as an NBA head coach. And with a 17-foot jump shot he made midway through the fourth quarter, Prince became the eighth player in franchise history to score 10,000 points in a Pistons uniform.
And he didn't even know it.
"It's meaningful because only eight guys" have done it, Prince said. "There would have been more that would have done it if they'd been in a Pistons uniform as long as I have been. As you know, I've never been a guy to go out there and try to put up big numbers on the offensive end every night. Due to how many years I've been here and coming back, I've had a chance to accomplish that. But I had no idea."