With nearly a week of rest, Celtics point guard Rajon Rondo is hopeful to be back in uniform Monday against the Knicks.
Rondo missed his third game in the last four last night against Philadelphia with a bruised back and a sore right hamstring. He said both injuries are improving but still hampering him. While Rondo took part in yesterday's shootaround, the only thing physical he did was ride the exercise bike. Rondo suffered the hamstring injury at Utah Dec. 29 and the back injury at New Jersey Jan. 11.
"It's a slow process, but hopefully I'll be back by Monday," Rondo said yesterday. "[The layoff is] helping me. I feel a lot better day by day. I'm still not ready for a game situation.
"When I shoot, I feel a lot better. But when I jump, I feel sharp [back] pains."
After last night's 116-89 win over the Sixers, the Celtics are 3-1 without Rondo.
When asked about the possibility of Rondo playing Monday, coach Doc Rivers said, "I don't know. I'm just going by how he feels. It could a week. It could be two weeks. Tomorrow he could feel great.
"We didn't give a date. I rarely do because that gets you in trouble with players. You give them a date and then they are not ready and they get hurt."
The Celtics have been pretty healthy thus far. Of the rest of the starters, shooting guard Ray Allen (right ankle) has missed two games, center Kendrick Perkins (right big toe) has missed one, and forwards Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce haven't missed any. Even when the Celtics have missed someone, Rivers believes his team has learned something from it.
"Adversity is good for us," Rivers said. "It's another game experience that we would have had, and every time we get through it it's another notch as far as learning how to deal with something else."
Pierce likes prep star
Then-NBA star Reggie Miller was so impressed with Pierce when he starred at Inglewood (Calif.) High that he would get him on the floor during exclusive pickup games with pros and college stars at UCLA in the offseason.Pierce is now equally impressed by Los Angeles Fairfax High forward Renardo Sydney, who is arguably the best junior in the country. In fact, the versatile 6-foot-9-inch, 240-pounder gave Pierce more than he expected during a one-on-one knockout game in Redondo Beach last offseason.
"I worked out with him one day," said Pierce, who likened Sydney to Lakers forward Lamar Odom. "He can handle, big, he has good size. He was nice. I couldn't believe he was in high school when I played him. He was good, man. He should be a pro.
"He could do pretty much everything. He made me kind of raise my game up. You don't want to let a high school guy beat you. I went extra hard on him . . . He scored a little bit on me. He didn't win."
On playing against NBA players when he was in high school, Pierce said: "I was a hungry young kid just trying to prove myself, trying to make a name for myself. I didn't get a lot of hype when I was real young until later in my high school career. So every time I stepped on the court, I tried to prove myself.
"I remember going to UCLA one time when I was in high school and I almost dunked on [then-NBA center] Olden Polynice. I called foul. He didn't want to give me the foul and we almost got into a fight."
Pollard almost ready
Rivers believes center Scot Pollard's lingering right ankle injury is "almost healthy" and he plans on using him against the Knicks. Pollard hasn't played the last five games. "I'm trying to do without him as long as I can to get him right," Rivers said . . . Pierce described his left foot stress reaction last season as a "misdiagnosis" and instead called it a broken foot. "I never heard of a stress reaction of the foot before. I'm calling it a broken foot," Pierce said . . . An NBA source said there is no truth to rumors the Celtics are trying to acquire Clippers point guard Sam Cassell. Cassell, 38, who is in the final year of his contract, making $6.1 million, played with Garnett in Minnesota.
