Shared from the 1/19/2017 The Providence Journal eEdition

CELTICS

Thomas in the MVP conversation

BOSTON — Late in Celtics games at the Garden, f a n s s e r e n a d e I s a i a h Thomas with chants of “MVP, MVP.”

A little more than halfway through the NBA season it’s time to start believing that Thomas deserves to be in the conversation. Russell Westbrook and James Harden may be the top two candidates, but Thomas certainly is valuable to the Celtics. With Thomas being the NBA’s most prolific fourth-quarter scorer since the NBA began keeping that stat in 1996, the Celtics took 26-15 record into Wednesday’s game against the Knicks. Without him, they might be below .500.

The Celtics lost three of the four games that Thomas missed in December with a groin injury, but they entered Wednesday 13-3 since he returned to the lineup.

Thomas enjoys the MVP chants.

“They’re pretty cool,” Thomas said. “I mean it just doesn’t seem real for them to be chanting, ‘MVP,’ to me in the Boston Garden. It’s a feeling I can’t explain.”

The Celtics have won a record 17 NBA championships, but they’ve had only four MVPs and none since Larry Bird won for the third consecutive year in 1986. Dave Cowens won in 1973, Bill Russell captured his fifth in 1965 and Bob Cousy won in 1957. Cousy is the only Celtics guard to win the award.

Even if Thomas doesn’t end up as MVP, he could settle for a nice consolation prize — being voted as a starter in the NBA All-Star Game, which will be played Feb. 19 in New Orleans. The fan voting ended on Monday and in the most recently released voting results, Thomas ranked fourth among Eastern Conference guards, trailing Kyrie Irving, Dwyane Wade and DeMar DeRozan. This year, for the first time, NBA players and media will join fans in selecting the starting lineups. Fans will account for 50 percent of the vote, players and media 25 percent each. Wade (18.8 pgg) shouldn’t make the final cut so Thomas will likely have to beat out DeRozan (28.2) for the second starting slot alongside Irving. The starters will be announced on Thursday.

“It would mean a lot,” Thomas said. “I mean that’s one of my goals. That’s what I’ve worked for. I think I’m putting myself in a good position to be named a starter, but we’ll see.”

Westbrook is leading the NBA in scoring (30.7) and averaging a triple-double

(10.5 rebounds and 10.3 assists), but his Thunder may not finish with a good enough record to warrant him winning the MVP. Harden ranks third in scoring (28.7), leads the league in assists (11.7) and averages 8.3 rebounds. Thomas averages only 6.1 assists and 2.7 rebounds, but he’s the best 3-point shooter of the three

(38.3 percent). The Celtics play a lot of close games so Thomas is needed in the fourth and he has responded by averaging 10.1 points and scoring at least 15 in the fourth quarter a league-high eight times.

“I’m in a really good place right now,” Thomas said. “My finger feels good. I can feel the ball and my teammates put me in that position to be me and that’s all I can say.’’

Thomas sprained the middle finger on his left (shooting) hand early in the season, but has shot the ball much better of late. While leading the Celtics to victories in seven of their last eight games entering Wednesday, he averaged 33.9 points and shot 50.6 percent from 3-point range.

If Thomas finished the season with his current average of 28.4 points, he’d record the fourth-highest scoring average in Celtics history, trailing only Bird

(29.9 in 1987-88 and 28.7 in 1984-85) and John Havlicek

(28.9 in 1970-71).

The 5-foot-9 Thomas studied a lot of film last summer to fine-tune his shooting. He’s been focusing on shooting the same way every time, going straight up and down, getting his feet under the ball and keeping his follow through up.

“Previous years, I was fading,” he said, “kicking one leg up, doing things like that. Now I’m trying to be more disciplined in my shooting.” He’s also getting his shot off quicker.

Knicks coach Jeff Hornacek coached Thomas in Phoenix in 2014-15 before the Celtics acquired him that February. Thomas averaged 15.2 points in 46 games, all but one off the bench, while Eric Bledsoe and Goran Dragic started.

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