The Celtics have gotten rid of their morning walkthrough, but that doesn’t mean we have to. Here are a few Celtics links, and maybe even an NBA link or two, to help wake you up and get you focused for the day.

Ben Wallace, what up?

Julian Benbow, Boston Globe – “Playing without home-court advantage for the first time since the 2004 playoffs, winning on the road already was a must for the Celtics. But dropping a very winnable series opener to the Cavaliers puts them in a position in which they’ll need to do it sooner rather than later. ‘Your sense of urgency has to go up,’ Pierce said. ‘You don’t ever want to go down 2-0, put yourself in that type of hole, especially against a team like Cleveland. The urgency is definitely there. Game 1 was important and we let it slip away. Hopefully, we can clean those things up, come back with the same type of mind-set, same type of energy, a little more perfection to our game and I think we’ll be all right. But definitely, we have to play Game 2 like it’s a Game 7.’ [...] ‘I think we’re going to create more [opportunities],’ Rivers said. ‘We let an opportunity go, but we’ll have more.’”

Chris Forsberg, ESPNBoston – “Now here’s another thread Boston hopes remains common between the two teams: The 1969 Celtics were one of only two Boston squads ever to lose Game 1 of a best-of-seven series on the road, then rally to win the series. Boston is a mere 2-6 in that situation, and 8-14 overall when losing Game 1 of a best-of-seven series regardless of home-court advantage. What’s more, teams with home-court advantage that win Game 1 of a best-of-seven series are 256-40 overall in the history of the NBA playoffs, a sterling 86.5 winning percentage. All of which is to say that the Celtics find themselves in an undesirable situation after Saturday’s Game 1 loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers in a conference semifinal series. Yet, Boston is hardly pressing the panic button. ‘If we take it to seven games, we’ll have three more opportunities to play here,’ point guard Rajon Rondo said before Sunday’s practice. ‘[Game 1] is behind us. We wish we could have had it back, but that’s yesterday.’”

Jodie Valade, Cleveland Plain Dealer – “The last time the Celtics won an NBA title, they held home-court advantage throughout the playoffs. This season, as in last, the Cavaliers hold home-court advantage each round. That’s what makes Boston’s goal for the first two games in Cleveland modest — just win one. Of course, after losing Game 1, the pressure is higher for Monday’s Game 2. ‘We’ve got to play Game 2 like it’s a Game 7,’ Pierce said Sunday. ‘Your sense of urgency goes up. You don’t want to go down 2-0 and put yourself in that kind of hole, especially against a team like Cleveland. The urgency is definitely there. We feel like [Game 1] is a game we let slip away by little things. So we’ve just got to clean those things up, come back with the same type of mindset, the same type of energy and with a little more perfection to our game and we’ll be OK.’”

Mark Murphy, Boston Herald – “‘I thought the jumpers we did get were good looks, but it gets to the point when the jumpers aren’t falling that Doc says to take the ball to the bucket,’ said Pierce. ‘That’s part of the game. You’re going to have shots that aren’t falling, then you have to get to the hole. I was disappointed with only going to the free throw line twice, so I have to be a little more aggressive. I’d still take the shots that I took in that game, though.’ Pierce may have felt good about his shots, but that doesn’t take away from the Celtics’ closing thud. They missed nine of their last 10 shots, including four misses by Pierce. The Big Three combined for two fourth-quarter baskets – a Pierce 3-pointer and a Kevin Garnett put-back off his own miss. Overall, Pierce, Garnett and Ray Allen shot 20-for-51 in Game 1, not too efficient. ‘I think we settled, but it boils down to being patient,’ said Allen. ‘It’s one thing to take what they give you, but sometimes you have to force the action.’”

Mark Murphy, Boston Herald – “When asked if he loses aggressiveness once he gets into foul trouble, Davis responded: ‘Most definitely. You get three fouls in the first half it hurts,’ he said. ‘You have to work on getting your rhythm and timing back. It never helps. Just have to see the way the game’s being called. You can’t foul. Whatever the ref thinks you’re doing, you can’t do it. You just have to learn from mistakes.’ Davis is also resigned to accumulating a generous amount of hacks every night. ‘I’m not trying to take my fouls with me anyway,’ he said. ‘Four or five fouls are nothing to me. We have so many guys who can play. We just have to step up.’ Doc Rivers likes the sound of a liberal-hacking policy. And the coach is not just talking about the time-proven, hack-a-Shaq tactic. ‘Honestly, LeBron (James), Mo Williams, all of them,’ he said. ‘They got layups last night and stood. We got layups last night and were on the floor.’”

Rich Levine, CSNNE – “The loss of focus and purpose in the second half is a problem that plagued them all season. ‘It’s definitely frustrating,’ said Paul Pierce, who scored only three second-half points on Saturday, and was 1-for-7 from the field in the fourth quarter. ‘I don’t know the explanation of it, but I think it’s something we’ve gotten better at as the season’s winded down, and in the playoffs. We’ve been a better second-half team. You know, I don’t even think about that. It’s the playoffs now. Obviously, you’re going to struggle with certain areas in certain quarters but I think as the series wears on, we’re gonna get better in the second half, regardless.’ The chance to prove that comes on Monday night, as the Celtics and Cavs reconvene at the Q for Game Two. And when they do, the Celtics expect to see the same level of intense, trapping and ball-hawking defense that gave them fits late in Game One. But after watching the film, Rivers believes his team now has a better grasp on how to cope. ‘When they load up on the ball, you catch, and then you put the ball back on the floor. And I thought we caught, and just shot,’ Rivers said. ‘There were so many openings where we should have caught it and put the ball right back onto the floor, right back into the paint, and we didn’t do that. ‘”

Steve Bulpett, Boston Herald – “‘I’m keeping it simple, just energy,’ Wallace said. ‘I ain’t trying to say too much. I ain’t trying to get fined again. Just energy.’” (Editor’s Note: LOL)

Julian Benbow, Boston Globe – “It wasn’t that Ray Allen wasn’t getting shots in the Celtics’ 101-93 loss to the Cavaliers in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference semifinals Saturday night. But the looks, said coach Doc Rivers, could have been better. Allen, Kevin Garnett, and Paul Pierce all had opportunities to put the Celtics ahead in the final minutes, but Rivers said the team could have made a better effort to get Allen open. ‘Ray, we’ve got to get him better shots,’ Rivers said. ‘We’ve got to get Ray shots. Paul’s got to be more aggressive. But that’s on us with Ray — on our team, on our bigs. Ray should have gotten better shots and we didn’t get him open. There were ample times to get him open and we didn’t do a good job. Ray’s going to get open.’”

Paul Flannery, WEEI – “Garnett scored 18 points on 9-for-20 shooting. The last time Garnett took that many shots in a game was back in November against the Suns in a helter-skelter offensive-minded game. It was also the only time he took that many shots. ‘No doubt,’ Rivers said when asked if they would keep working Garnett down low. ‘He’s just got to be aggressive. I thought he started the third quarter being a passer. He’s just so unselfish that it’s really difficult, but he understands that.’ So, once again, we are faced with the eternal paradox of Kevin Garnett. He is a great passer and he and Rondo have worked the two-man game down low as well as any duo in the league at times. He’s also a very good shooter from 20 feet and that opens up all kinds of driving lanes for Rondo, Pierce and Allen. But in this series Garnett has to be a little selfish. ‘It was really good because he was aggressive and he was attacking but he’s got to stay on that,’ Rivers said. ‘He fights his own self because people don’t get that. They criticize him for being unselfish, which is the craziest thing on earth, but that is who he is.’”

A. Sherrod Blakely, CSNNE – “When Rondo collided with Shaquille O’Neal in Game One, it took Rondo a minute or two to get to his feet. As painful as the thought of his lithe frame colliding with O’Neal’s 300-plus pound frame, Rondo said that wasn’t what really hurt. ‘It’s not him. It’s the floor,’ Rondo said. ‘I’m taking the hit from him. It’s when I hit the floor. The floor is the hardest thing I hit.’”

Terry Pluto, Cleveland Plain Dealer – “An assistant coach at St. Vincent-St. Mary during the James Era, Steve Culp also noticed that James stayed away from self pity. ‘When things went wrong, he’d get very quiet, a little sad,’ said Culp. ‘He’s smart. He was thinking about it. But he was not the kind of kid who lashed out, and a lot of kids who grow up in his circumstances are angry.’ Men such as Dambrot, Joyce, Culp and Cotton have watched James mature, but they still marvel at his ability to hit the right notes in public with the same ease that he makes the proper decisions on the court. ‘He has never been afraid to carry the torch [of leadership],’ said Cotton, whose son, Sian, played with James in youth leagues and at St. Vincent-St. Mary. Dambrot said, ‘He wanted to have the award ceremony at Akron, doing it in front of his people in his city.’ James brought his entire Cavs team on stage when he was handed the MVP trophy — just as he did last season. But you can go back to the night of the NBA lottery when Cleveland won his draft rights — all of his high school teammates came up on stage that evening at a local hotel for his press conference. ‘LeBron has made it hard for me to coach all these other guys after him,’ said Dambrot. ‘Not because of his talent, but he was such a great teammate, so unselfish. He respects his coaches. He just gets it.’”

Have a link I might want to look at? Send it my way by email (jayking@celticstown.com) or Twitter.