Cowens Says Celtics' Slump Is Just Temporary

Dave Cowens is sitting around in a rugby shirt and a pair of grey cotton slacks, feeding his electric juicer with apple slices. As he gulps down the glasses of frothy, fresh-fruit juice, he sits quietly on a stool in his kitchen.

There is no despair in his face, no sign that he is playing for a team which is 1-7 and fighting with the New Jersey Nets for sole possession of the cellar in the NBA East. He does not seem worried that John Havlicek is closing in on age 40 or that JoJo White is starting to notice more grey hairs.

The Celtic center does not even seem very worried about having turned 28 years of age just two weeks earlier. His team is on the skids, but the big redhead from Kentucky is not panicking--he is sure the Celtics will bounce back. It is just a matter of time.

"We have enough talent, we just have to break out of the slump," he said last week in an exclusive interview with The Crimson. "We've just got to have a little patience."

But for Cowens and the rest of Boston's Celtics, losing is a new game; Celtic history is a glorious one, and learning to cope with so much defeat is what Dave Cowens says is the big issue right now.

"The pressure to win is a nice kind of pressure," he explains. "When you're losing you come in with a negative kind of pressure...players quit early...they don't give themselves a chance."

He says that a team that's a winner will keep playing when it's behind because "it' knows how to win and doesn't know how to lose." But now, the Celtics are fighting against a losing attitude.

"It's an intangible that's not in the statistics. It's an underlying negative bias," explains the Celtics' first-round pick in the 1970 draft. "Upfront no one's thinking about losing, but in the back of his mind, he's wondering `why?'"

Wondering?

And the Celtics are indeed wondering now, having gone down to defeat so often in the season's first month.

"You can get tired of continually scrapping to come from behind," Cowens says. "We have to get back on the track and break ourselves out of it. Maybe we should go to a chemistry class and get the formula for winning."

But Cowens knows as well as everyone else that there's no simple formula. The first step for the Celtics, though, is to find themselves and regain some team unity.

"We just haven't worked together long enough, and it takes a few weeks or a month to develop some unity," Cowens says. "We have to play exemplary defense because of our small size. We have to get tough out front and put the pressure on outside. If we let teams set up and get the ball down low, we'll have trouble."

The cooperation necessary to carry out that type of tough team defense is what Cowens says the Celtics have been missing. They've also been missing the basket.

"Our outside shooting has not been up to par. We have to put the ball in the hole," the Florida State graduate says. "If not, teams will give us the long shots and play the percentages. That's where a coach comes in--he has to make the adjustments and work with the percentages."

Cowens sees fine-tuning as a vital link in a team's progress towards consistent victory. He says that players don't change their individual style of play from game to game. It's more of a coordinated shift from an entire unit.

"Players can do different things," he says. "Some press well, some shoot well, and the coach has to work with the abilities he's got. The coach has to devise a team strategy, and that strategy is what shifts, depending on the opposing team's abilities.

"I don't really change my game, no matter who I play against. It's a team game and you have to work together to get the job done," Cowens, who has grabbed almost 8000 rebounds in his NBA career, says. "If you're not working together, each individual has to work harder, and that's when there are problems."

But the Celtics are still individuals this season, working on putting it together. There are new faces and old ones, and coach Tom Heinsohn has not yet found the right combination for his team. Bright spots have been infrequent for the Celtics in '77, but the latest one has been Cedrick "Cornbread" Maxwell, the Celtics' talented rookie.

"Cedrick proved himself against the Cavaliers," Cowens says. "He's a good player, he's active, and he knows what's going on, but he has to get much more physical. That takes time...he'll get used to it and learn what he can get away with."

Maxwell is the new face on the floor, but the Celtics also have a new man on the bench: former Harvard head basketball coach Tom "Satch" Sanders. As an assistant to Heinsohn and the team's chief scout, Sanders will have a major impact on the Celtics' future.

"Satch is much different than the screaming, cursing, excited coach. He knows the game, is quiet and direct." Cowens says. "He calls the players, `Gentleman.'"

Behind the players and coaches, Cowens considers another factor as key in the Celtics' fate: the fans. He says the Celtics need support from their fans now more than ever.

"It's like a guy who has just lost his job...he needs his family," the 6-ft. 9-in., 230-pound center says. "We've given the fans exciting, winning basketball for many years, and we'll continue to give them exciting ball--hopefully also winning ball. The people in Boston are so used to winning though, I hope they don't get fickle. They will hopefully just come out for the sake of watching good basketball."

But Cowens knows these hopes are a bit unrealistic.

"If you lose continuously, the fans won't keep coming out.... That's just the way it is," he says, "Unless of course you have a guy like Pete Maravich who puts on a show that the press can exploit."

But when you boil down the whole Celtic mess, things come right down to Cowens; for as Cowens goes, so go the Celtics.

Last season, after Cowens took a mid-year leave-of-absence, the Celtics struggled through 30 games at almost .500. Some said that the team's ability to win without Cowens showed that the center with an 18.8-point career scoring average is not so crucial to Boston's success. But that was just Celtic optimism. In reality, .500 basketball will get Boston nowhere fast.

But Cowens says his leave is history and he is now back for good.

"Last year...that's all over," he explains. "I never had any qualms about playing basketball, I just did what I thought was best at the time. Right now I want to play basketball and I'm just gonna keep playing until...well, I'm not sure when. Then I'll just quit or go someplace far, far away."

Cowens says he has no thoughts now about retirement. Currently in his eighth NBA season with the Celtics, he is still confident of his abilities.

"I certainly feel different than when I first started playing with the Celtics," he says. "You feel age especially in the position I play because it involves so much strength. But I feel I can still battle with the best of them."

Cowens says that with increasing age, you get tired a little faster and don't have that extra reserve late in the game that you used to have. "But," he adds, "you watch your diet a little more, get your rest, work out plenty, and pace yourself in the games."

Yet after the game there's more wear and tear, with thousand of miles to travel during the 82-game NBA season. And being on the road so much has its effects.

"Like John Havlicek says, it's possible that you have fewer distractions on the road with no phone calls or family business to worry about," Cowens explains. "You can just lock yourself in your hotel room and think about the game."

"Preparation-wise, it may be better on the road, but there's still nothing to replace a home-cooked meal no matter how gourmet-ish the restaurant."

Cowen likes the home-town crowd and the hometown cooking. But now he'd like some wins, home or away, more than anything else.

"We're definitely gonna do better than we're doing now," he predicts. "It's just a question of everyone realizing what it's going to take to turn things around. We have to get together."