Paul Pierce stops the bickering and focuses the fight

By now you should have heard or read about the bickering that was going on at halftime of last night's game. If not, here's some more details.

Paul Pierce sets teammates straight | Boston Herald

“Doc (Rivers) came in and just wanted to tell guys what was wrong,” said Pierce, “and it just seemed like we were looking at one another and it was just like, you know, we’ve got to be able to accept coaching. Doc’s telling them what’s wrong, and, you know, guys are getting mad at him. And I’m like, this ain’t it. Don’t get mad at Doc. He’s coaching. We’ve got to get mad at this other team. It was needed.

Pierce's leadership gets Celtics on track

"We're kind of bickering with each other at halftime about what to do defensively, and I just reminded the guys that the fight isn't against us, it's against the other team," Pierce said. "Once we remembered that, we stepped up and played the kind of basketball that we're capable of playing."

You can speculate all day long about who might be the ones bickering and if there may or may not be a "divide" in the locker room. It wouldn't be hard to imagine Rajon Rondo getting cranky or Kevin Garnett or Jason Terry getting loud. But this is nothing new for this team (remember Rondo throwing a water bottle through a TV screen in the playoffs a few years back?).

I'm not trying to discount it off hand. I'm not in the locker room and I don't have any inside sources. So it is certainly possible that the problems are deep rooted and destined to rip this team apart sooner or later. But I'm not going to assume that either.

It is just as likely (or more likely I believe) that this is just another case of a team acting like a family. While there's arguing and bickering and maybe even some fighting involved, at the end of the day they are all on the same team and working towards the same goal and (I would imagine) would run through walls for each other.

Last night it simply took the Captain pointing their energy in the correct direction. "The battle is out there guys, not in here." (or something like that)

Hopefully they'll maintain that focus and fight the other team with defensive domination like they did in the 3rd quarter last night.