Bird’s Soaring Theft, Assist Stagger the Pistons, 108-107

Detroit’s Dennis Rodman: “The last five seconds were like a nightmare. I wanted to cry. I just stood there and said: ‘This isn’t happening. Tell me this just isn’t happening.’ ”

Boston’s Dennis Johnson: “How many times have you heard (Celtic broadcaster ) Johnny Most scream it? ‘He stole the ball! He stole the ball!’ About three times in 30 or 40 years, that’s how many. This one is right up there with those. God, it’s just like a dream.”

A young equipment manager for the Boston Celtics, Wayne Lebeaux, slid the video cassette into the recorder and said: “OK, gather ‘round and watch this. I’m only going to show this once.”

A mob in the Boston locker room inched forward like cattle to see it: Larry Bird, stealing Isiah Thomas’ in-bounds pass, then feeding the ball to Dennis Johnson, whose driving, twisting lay-up with one second to play gave the Celtics a 108-107 victory over the Detroit Pistons Tuesday night at Boston Garden in Game 5 of the National Basketball Assn.’s Eastern Conference finals.

People pushed and shoved and elbowed like 7-foot centers and stood on their tiptoes to see.

“Play it again,” someone begged.

“Oh, what the heck,” the equipment manager said. “Let’s play it all night.”

And he ran it and ran it--constant replay--because he and everyone else in the room already knew that they had just seen a game and a play to remember. Bird’s steal will go down in Celtic lore, along with John Havlicek’s game-saving steal against Philadelphia in the 1965 Eastern Conference finals, and Gerald Henderson’s theft of James Worthy’s pass in Game 2 of the 1984 NBA championship series against the Lakers.

“It was just luck, luck and being in the right place at the right time,” Bird said. “We’re lucky to be alive tonight, much less leading the series.”

The last-second play was the climax of a vicious and delicious game of basketball, a game that gave Boston a 3-2 advantage in its best-of-seven series with Detroit. Had it not been for Thomas’ terrible pass or Bird’s incredible play--however one chooses to remember it--the Pistons would be in position to bump off the NBA defending champions Thursday night at the Pontiac Silverdome, and to meet the Lakers for the championship.

Instead, they must win on their home floor just to stay alive and to earn one more trip to the Boston torture chamber, where the Celtics now have won 84 of 87 games over the last two seasons.

The Celtics in Game 6 must do without Coach K.C. Jones, who will be in San Francisco for his mother’s funeral. They also might be without center Robert Parish, who had to be helped off the court Tuesday after doing further damage to a badly sprained ankle. A Celtic spokesman said Parish is expected to make the trip, but his status is uncertain.

Parish showed both courage and malice in Game 5. In the final half-minute of the first half, he knocked down and bloodied Detroit center Bill Laimbeer with two punches to the head, after a struggle beneath the basket in which Laimbeer appeared to inadvertently elbow Parish in the throat.

The Piston center, who was fined $5,000 for a fracas involving Bird during Saturday’s Game 3, was astounded that Parish was not ejected after punching him. Officials Jack Madden and Jess Kersey did not even call a technical foul.

“Neither Jess nor I saw any punch thrown by anyone at any time in the game,” Madden said. “I saw Laimbeer foul, but I don’t know how he fell.”

Kersey already had called a personal foul on another player, so Parish was called for nothing. “I didn’t see any punches,” Kersey said.

Laimbeer certainly did. The inside of his mouth was a bloody mess. “What do you expect? They’re the Boston Celtics. They get away with murder,” Laimbeer said.

“I knew when K.C. Jones didn’t get fined for his participation in Saturday’s fight that the Celtics could get away with anything,” Laimbeer added.

Anticipating a hostile reception in this city, Laimbeer registered in his team’s hotel under a phony name, and had the switchboard deliberately refer calls to the wrong hotel. During dinner Monday night with teammates Kurt Nimphius and Chuck Nevitt, Laimbeer exchanged plates with them and joked: “Maybe you guys better taste the food.”

The sellout crowd of 14,890 at the Garden was waiting for him, all right. They waved wanted posters with his picture on them, and someone dangled boxing gloves from the balcony railings. They cheered when, for the second straight game, Bird ignored Laimbeer’s pregame handshake, and cheered harder when the Pistons, after Laimbeer’s lay-up nine seconds into the game, failed to score for the next three minutes and fell behind, 9-2.

Detroit trailed in the first half by as many as a dozen points, 48-36. Bird, who scored 36 points, had 12 rebounds and 9 assists. He even made one basket when Dennis Johnson deliberately banked a pass to him off the backboard.

But that was nothing, next to what Bird and Johnson did to win the game.

Let’s run the videotape back to the final minute:

Danny Ainge, who made his first start of the series, hit a jump shot with 53 seconds remaining to put the Celtics on top, 106-103.

Laimbeer, who cleared 14 rebounds in the game but shot poorly, swished one from 20 feet to make it 106-105. Time on the clock: 0:47.

Bird drove the baseline and missed. Rick Mahorn rebounded and Detroit called time: 0:27.

Thomas rushed an off-balance turnaround shot from 17 feet but made it, giving Detroit a 107-106 lead. Boston called time: 0:17.

Bird worked the baseline again. He drove for a layup. Rodman, the Piston rookie, rejected it. The ball bounced toward the sideline. Mahorn and Boston’s Jerry Sichting chased it. Mahorn slapped it off Sichting’s leg. Piston ball: 0:05.

The game was theirs. They even had a timeout left. Coach Chuck Daly even tried to call one.

Nobody noticed.

Thomas took the ball out of bounds, from the sideline near the Boston basket. Like a hockey player committing the cardinal sin--passing in front of his own net--Thomas looped a lazy lob to Laimbeer, who was a few feet from the hoop.

He could have thrown it harder. He could have thrown it to the other end of the court. He could have done a lot of things with it.

Instead, he threw it away. Threw maybe the whole thing away--the season, the playoffs, the championship.

“We had the game. We gave it back,” Thomas said.

Bird swooped in front of Laimbeer and stole the ball with his right hand. He tucked it in with his left, and did a balancing act not to step out of bounds on the end line.

Then he had incredible presence of mind. “I knew how much time was left,” Bird said, “and I counted it down.”

Four, three, two . . .

Johnson had presence of mind, also. He zipped straight toward the basket, with Detroit’s Joe Dumars in hot pursuit and most everybody else frozen solid.

Bird got it to Johnson, who scooped a difficult shot into the hoop.

“I never thought it was going in,” Bird said. “I just thought it was going to be a heck of a try.”

It went in.

There was one second remaining when the stunned Pistons called time. On an in-bounds play from midcourt, Adrian Dantley’s pass went off Laimbeer and out of bounds, right in front of the Detroit bench. There wasn’t even a last shot.

But at least the Pistons believe they still will have a last shot.

“We’re not done yet,” Thomas said. “We’re OK. If we win at home Thursday, we can still do it. Don’t call us dead yet.”

“We know they’re still alive, but they’ve got to be reeling a little,” Sichting said. “That’s got to be the hardest way to lose there is.”

To lose a great game, an important game, on a steal of an in-bounds pass? That’s a hard one, all right. About as hard as it gets.

“It was a great game,” Bird said. “Well, I guess it’s a great game if your team won it.”

Playoff Notes

Boston outscored Detroit in only one period, the first. . . . Piston Coach Chuck Daly on Robert Parish’s punchout of Bill Laimbeer: “I was shocked that the officials didn’t see it. It looked like it was clearly a flagrant foul.” Daly appealed to the officials to consult with the alternate referee, to no avail.. . . Laimbeer: “I just assumed he would be ejected. He just turned around and hit me. I was expecting somebody to take a swing at me before the night was over. Some guys couldn’t resist the temptation to hit back, but at that point I thought it made no sense for me to get ejected, too. Parish would be gone, and that would help us win.” Parish limped out of the arena on his sprained left ankle, without comment. . . . Asked repeatedly if he could describe his feelings over the bad pass, Isiah Thomas replied softly: “No, I can’t.” Later, after most of the locker room had cleared, he said: “It hurts. You can see I should have called a timeout. You can see I should not have thrown the pass. You can see I should have thrown it harder, or Bill should have come toward it. But all I can say is, they stole the ball and they won the game.” . . . Said Dennis Johnson: “It was sort of a lazy pass, and Laimbeer should have been more aggressive. I know Isiah wishes he could have it back.” . . . A giddy Kevin McHale, who scored 20 points on a fractured foot and sprained ligaments, added: “The play Larry Bird made was unbelievable. The shot DJ made was unbelieveable. Yogi (Berra) said it first, ‘It ain’t over till it’s over.’ Then Larry said it, right after Yogi.” . . . Dennis Rodman, ridiculed after his last appearance at the Garden for airballs on two free throws, did not attempt one this time, but was 7 of 7 from the floor. . . . In what was a rough, almost violent game, two players fouled out and five others drew five fouls. Jack Madden and Jess Kersey called 32 personals on the Pistons, 23 on the Celtics. . . . When Parish hobbled off with 3:41 to play, the crowd chanted: “Walton! Walton!” But with Bill Walton still hurting too much to play, Darren Daye came in instead. Daye, from UCLA, gave the Celtics a quality 22 minutes in the game before fouling out. . . . Game 6 won’t begin Thursday until 9 p.m., Eastern time.