O’Brien Steps Down as Celtic Coach

Jim O’Brien quit as coach of the Boston Celtics on Tuesday, after half a season under new boss Danny Ainge.

Ainge said O’Brien told him he wanted to resign at a meeting Tuesday morning, one of their regularly scheduled sit-downs to discuss “philosophical differences” on running the team.

“The philosophical differences, I thought, were much smaller than Jim thought,” said Ainge, who announced O’Brien’s departure at a news conference at the team’s practice facility in Waltham, Mass.

Assistant coach John Carroll will take over for the rest of the season, Ainge said. Another assistant coach, Dick Harter, was let go.

Ainge said he took a more long-term view of building the team, while O’Brien was more concerned with short-term results.

“Jim did not see that long-term vision that I saw,” said Ainge, who took over as the team’s director of basketball operations during last season’s playoffs and gave O’Brien a two-year contract extension in the off-season.

Ainge, who appeared at the news conference with one of the team’s owners, Wyc Grousbeck, was also trying to add more offense while O’Brien had always emphasized defense.

“He was not sure he’s the man for that job.... He didn’t want to take our money and our time under false pretenses,” Grousbeck said.

Ainge, who said he was surprised by O’Brien’s decision, also said he and O’Brien differed over whether to play some of the older players.

“We felt that there was a ceiling on the success of the old players ... so we did not always agree on the players who should be on the court,” Ainge said.

O’Brien, 51, was unavailable for comment.

The Celtics are 22-24 after reaching the playoffs the last two seasons. O’Brien, who had a 139-119 record, became coach when Rick Pitino resigned in January 2001. He took the Celtics to the Eastern Conference finals in 2002 and the conference semifinals in 2003.

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Star forward Jamal Mashburn was activated from the injured list by the New Orleans Hornets and is expected to play his first game of the season tonight against the Milwaukee Bucks.

Mashburn, who led the team in scoring last season with a 21.6 average, has been sidelined since hurting his right knee early in training camp. He had surgery, missing the preseason and 44 regular-season games.

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Indiana Pacer forward Ron Artest is day to day because of a sprained left thumb that is not damaged as badly as thought, the team said.

It was determined after Artest flew to New York on Monday for a second opinion that he did not have torn ligaments but only a sprain.

Artest said he thought he could play with the injury.

“It won’t affect me much,” Artest said. “I’m a righty anyway. I’ll just have to play through it and get used to it.”