Celtics and Ford Rip Into Clippers

It took a 34-point defeat in front of his family and old friends for Clipper Coach Chris Ford to finally say enough is enough.

“I think you want professionalism from your players. They are putting on NBA uniforms, they are supposed to be the elite of the world, not only our country but the world. You would think they would have more passion for the game itself,” Ford said after the Clippers’ 118-84 loss to the Boston Celtics on Wednesday night, their worst defeat of the year.

“Forget about anything else. The money, the winning and losing. Just the passion of playing the game of basketball. Growing up as a kid when you were out on the playground, you played with passion. . . . You accepted the challenge to be king of the hill. Do whatever it takes to be competitive.

“So far our guys--not all of them and not enough certainly, have stepped up and accepted the challenge. We might be undermanned, we might be undersized, but nothing should stop you from playing with passion.”

Boston, which handed the Clippers their 21st defeat in 22 games and fourth in a row, seemed to take turns going through fundamental drills against the league’s worst defensive team and next-to-worst rebounding team.

Point guard Kenny Anderson, who led Boston with 21 points, was the leader of the Celtics’ dribble penetration drill. Antoine Walker, who had 14 points and eight rebounds, along with Vitaly Potapenko and former Laker Tony Battie, led the team’s rebounding drill as Boston outrebounded the Clippers, 56-37. And Dana Barros and Ron Mercer led Boston’s passing drill as they combined for 12 of the Celtics’ 29 assists compared to the Clippers’ 11.

When asked if he has run out of ways to motivate his team, Ford responded: “They’re NBA players. They’re making a lot of money. Isn’t that enough for them to go out there and play hard? Is that asking too much? I think not.”

It was clear that the lack of effort by the Clippers, who spent much of Wednesday’s game gasping for air while playing their seventh game in nine nights, embarrassed Ford, a former Boston player and coach who won three NBA titles with the Celtics.

“Right now it’s at the point where I find it very difficult to sugarcoat things,” Ford said.

Losing has been hard on rookie center Michael Olowokandi. The No. 1 overall pick led the Clippers with 17 points, but fellow rookie Paul Pierce, the 10th overall pick who starts for Boston, clearly is in a better situation.

“It’s hard to tell, but if we did get the effort that was needed we wouldn’t have gotten beaten by 34 points,” Olowokandi said. “It’s getting tougher to tougher. [Losing] is kind of hard to deal with, but I don’t have a choice but to deal with it.”

Pierce, a Los Angeles native, had 12 points in his second game since returning to the lineup after an ankle injury. He said that although he has criticized teams that passed on him in last year’s draft, he’s glad that he wasn’t chosen by the Clippers.

“The Clipper organization, you never know what they are going to do. They make so many changes every year. There’s never a consistent base,” Pierce said. “It would have been nice to play at home, but not this early in my career. I wouldn’t want to go home and feel the type of pressure [of being the savior of the franchise].”

The Clippers trailed by only five points at the end of the first quarter, but instead of waiting until the fourth quarter to collapse, as they had in their previous three losses, the Clippers fell apart in the second against Boston.

Walker, who struggled early, teamed with Pierce to break the game open. They combined for 19 first-half points and the Celtics held a commanding 54-39 lead at the break.

The worn-out Clippers basically mailed it in from there as they lost their 19th consecutive road game dating to last season.