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The Celtics today assigned second-year forward Bill Walker to the Maine Red Claws of the NBA Development League.

Walker, who is working his way back after arthroscopic right knee surgery at the beginning of October, returned to practice last week and appeared in the final two minutes of a lopsided win over Utah on Nov. 11.

The Washington Wizards selected Walker in the second round (47th overall) of the 2008 draft before shipping him to Boston for cash considerations. He appeared in 29 games during his rookie season, averaging 3 points and 1 rebound per game.

Walker also spent 15 game with the Utah Flash of the NBDL last season, averaging 18.9 points, 5.3 rebounds, 1.5 assists, and 1.3 steals per contest.

According to the Red Claws, Walker will be in uniform for a scrimmage on Sunday (Portland) and the team's first preseason game Monday (vs. Springfield in Augusta).

For the Celtics, who are relatively healthy (Tony Allen remains sidelined with a lingering right ankle injury), it's a chance to get Walker game action and still have him in arm's reach should an emergency situation arise. For the Red Claws, it adds a known name as they launch their inaugural season.

BOSTON -- Two nights after putting the Celtics on his back in the second half of a win over the Golden State Warriors, Rajon Rondo found himself confined to the bench during crucial moments of Friday's loss to the Magic.

Rondo finished with 6 points, 6 assists, and 3 turnovers in 29 minutes, but struggled to guide the offense as efficiently as he had the previous game. Celtics coach Doc Rivers leaned on backup guard Eddie House to bring Boston back from two double-digit deficits.

"Today, Rajon just didn't play well," said Rivers. "And Eddie -- there's no conspiracy here. Eddie had it going, defensively he was good. And when Eddie plays good defense, it allows him to stay on the floor. So, he spaced the floor, he did his job."

When reporters persisted about whether the lack of execution Friday fell on Rondo, Rivers defended his fourth-year guard.

"It's not on Rondo. No, no, no," said Rivers. "No, as a group we have to play better. But, listen, Rondo didn't play well today. He's been pretty good for the most part, he won the game for us the other night. So, no, it's just as a group. We are not functioning well as a group, all five on the floor."

Rondo subbed back in with 1:41 to go in the game with the Celtics trailing by a bucket and couldn't convert a driving layup. Boston was desperate for someone to settle a frantic offense, but not even Rondo could calm them.

Asked if Rondo's lack of playing time in the fourth quarter was an issue, Pierce said it was the coach's decision.

"Rondo's a defender, he gets steals, he causes havoc," said Pierce. "But that's what coaches do. They devise the schemes, they put the players in... We're players, we're asked to go out on the court and the coaches are putting the players on the court. It's not our job to be saying, 'Put Rajon in the game.' We're out there trying to win as a team, it's not about one individual."

BOSTON -- Hedo Turkoglu, where have you gone?

The Celtics expected the departure of Turkoglu, who will come to Boston next Friday as a member of the Toronto Raptors, to potentially be an advantage when the Orlando Magic visited the TD Garden Friday night in the first meeting since last year's Eastern Conference semifinal playoff series.

But Turkoglu's departure forced the Magic to aggressively pursue Vince Carter during the offseason and the 12th-year swingman slayed Boston with his clutch shooting.

Carter's field goal percentage isn't eye-popping (10 for 29, 34.5 percent) -- in fact it matches Boston's dismal effort overall -- but he poured in a game-high 26 points and shined in crunch time.

"In this kind of basketball game, you don't want to let down," said Carter. "It would have been great to make 29 shots, make some of the layups I missed -- I missed like four of them -- but all that matters is getting the win. We knew it was going to be a hard-fought game regardless. We knew they were going to make a run, they play well here. So it was, 'Can we sustain and persevere?' "

The answer is a resounding, "Yes." When Boston closed within one at 75-74 with 5:16 to go, Carter hit a 7-foot baby hook. When Boston tied the game at 78, he hit a fearless 12-foot turnaround fadeaway to regain the lead for good.

"Against great defenses down the stretch, it's sometimes hard to free people up," explained Magic coach Stan Van Gundy. "You gotta have a guy -- a Paul Pierce, a Vince Carter, a Dwyane Wade, a LeBron James -- someone who can get a shot against a good defense. Vince can get off a pretty good quality shot all the time and at least you will have a chance, even if the defense is good."

Added Rashard Lewis: "He is the guy we went to pretty much the whole game -- went to him on pick-and-rolls, we thought we had a mismatch on the post. He came up with some big shots."

Carter is simply happy to be playing for a winning team and beating good competition.

"I don't put any pressure on myself, I am just thankful that I was able to come to a great team and that, in the early point of the season, they have this confidence in me," said Carter. "Whether it is putting it in the basket or trying to find the right guys. I am just glad I was able to deliver."

BOSTON -- A healthy Kevin Garnett was supposed to be enough to reverse Boston's fortunes against an Orlando Magic squad that bounced the Celtics from the playoffs last season.

Instead, Garnett struggled as mightily as his Celtics teammates as Orlando escaped with a 83-78 triumph Friday night at the TD Garden.

Garnett finished 5 of 13 shooting with 13 points, 11 rebounds, and 3 blocked shots.

To be sure, there were some bright spots, but his night will be remembered largely for two lowlights: Garnett tweaking his knee in the third quarter and, despite staying in the game, he clanged a potential game-tying baseline jumper off the iron with little more than a minute to go, allowing Orlando to hold on for victory.

Celtics coach Doc Rivers acknowledged that he's still working his way back.

"He's healthy, but one day he's explosive, one day he's not," said Rivers. "That's going to take time. We knew that coming into the year. You'd love to have him explosive when you can pick the nights. 'OK, tonight let's be explosive,' or 'Tomorrow, we don't need you.' But you could see that tonight.

"Guys get injured, you know how they come back -- it takes time. Some days you have legs, some days you don't. It doesn't matter what injury it is, almost. You can have a shoulder injury. That's just how it works."

Garnett finished minus-11 in the plus/minus category, a reflection of how poorly the starters played, particularly in the first and third quarters.

"I know we're a better scoring team, but we're a defensive team," said Garnett. "We wear our hat on it. We go out and, for some reason, we haven't been getting the stops."

Garnett tweaked his knee in the third quarter, but waved off Rasheed Wallace when Rivers tried to substitute immediately after the play. Garnett looked no worse for the wear after the game.

Celtics forward Kevin Garnett appeared to tweak his surgically-repaired right knee during the third quarter of Friday's game against the Orlando Magic.

Garnett twisted awkwardly after receiving the ball in the paint on a Boston possession. He grimaced in pain and hobbled for a second on the knee, trying to stretch it out.

Doc Rivers motioned to Rasheed Wallace, who headed for the scorer's table, but Garnett waved him off near midcourt and stayed in the game.

A minute later, Garnett swatted a Dwight Howard attempt in the paint at the other end of the floor, seemingly suggesting the knee was fine.

The Celtics debuted (or dusted off) a couple of motivational symbols this week.

On Thursday, we showed you the mysterious 18 sign that has returned to the road leading to Boston's practice facility in Waltham. On Friday, we snapped a picture of this poster that hangs near the exit of the Celtics' locker room at the TD Garden.

The poster features a picture of the Larry O'Brien trophy, awarded each year to the NBA Finals winner, with the following quote:

"Begin with the end in mind."

It's a quote from author and management expert Stephen Covey and part of the title of the second chapter of his best-selling book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.

For the Celtics, the poster is a not-so subtle reminder of what they hope to obtain this season, even as the journey just begins.

BOSTON -- Orlando’s Dwight Howard made an extra effort last season to get rid of a key roadblock in his relationship with Stan Van Gundy. He taught his coach how to text.

“He’s actually pretty good at it,” Howard said from the visitors’ locker room at TD Garden before Friday night’s game. “He knows all the little LOLs and everything.”

Van Gundy does not, however, text smiley faces.

“I don’t get no smiley faces,” Howard said, “but I’ll get the LOL, ‘Talk to you later,’ all that stuff.”

A smiley face would be out of character for Van Gundy, a coach whose perceived negativity made headlines earlier this week. The coach and his star player met privately to discuss the way the coach had been dwelling more on the failures of his 9-3 team than on its successes.

“I just told him I felt like, sometimes, as a coach, we need to see a little more positive than negative,” Howard said. “He felt that I was right.”

Contrary to perception, Van Gundy said, it wasn’t Howard who initiated the conversation. It was Van Gundy who went to Howard after Orlando beat Charlotte on Monday to have a chat, coach to star player, about how best to get the Magic to play with more energy.

Howard first brought up a couple of other issues -- the burden of high expectations, for example, and the injuries that have come fast and furious for the Magic since the season began. But the persistent negativity coming from the bench was the primary issue.

“That was probably the main part,” Howard said. “We just talked about how to get our team to the next level and what he needed out of me and what he expected out of me and the rest of my teammates. He said he’s going to do a better job of making sure that he’s more upbeat and positive, and he wants me to make sure my teammates are coming out with energy and playing as hard as we did in the preseason or last season.”

Van Gundy even ridiculed himself a bit in his pregame session with the media on Friday.

“Making a blanket statement -- ‘We’re playing like crap’ -- what do you do with that statement?” Van Gundy said. “That doesn’t help you do anything. What you need to do is, ‘Dammit, guys, we’re not getting back. We need to get back, all the way back, stop the ball and get matched up. We need to put more effort into that.’ That’s constructive. That’s still intense. That’s still correcting.

“I’m not going to pat guys on the back and say, ‘Don’t worry. If you don’t want to get back tonight, it’s no big deal. If you don’t want to rotate defensively, look, as long as you’re happy, we’re good with that.’ That’s not me. I don’t want that to be me. To be quite honest, Dwight and I talked about this, and he doesn’t want that to be me.”

Getting back, of course, becomes more difficult against Celtics speedster Rajon Rondo, one of the fastest end-to-end players in the league. Rondo had five double-doubles in the seven games of the Eastern Conference semifinals a season ago, including 21 points and 14 rebounds in the Celtics’ win in Game 4.

“I don’t know that there’s anybody in the league faster,” Van Gundy said. “He and Derrick Rose (are) pretty damn quick, and we saw those two matched up in the playoffs last year. It’s tough keeping him out of the paint with his speed -- and, defensively, he can disrupt you with that quickness, too.”

At the other end, point guard Jameer Nelson will miss up to six weeks with a torn meniscus in his knee. Nelson was averaging 13.5 points per game and a team-best 5.5 assists per game when he went down. Most importantly, though, he was a guy who could get into the paint and relieve a little pressure on the Magic’s 3-point shooters.

“We lose one of our guys who really attacks the basket, and we don’t have that many of those guys,” Van Gundy said. “Really, it’s he and Vince (Carter) who are really the guys who attack the basket. When Jameer is out, we’re really different in that sense because we don’t get as much penetration into the paint and don’t put as much pressure on the defense -- plus the fact that he’s a 40-percent 3-point shooter.”

In the wake of reports that Dwight Howard asked Magic coach Stan Van Gundy to tone down his negativism earlier this week, Celtics coach Doc Rivers was peppered with questions before Friday's game about how he balances instructing players without hurting their feelings.

"I don't think we berate -- it's because we're talking about getting out to that guy and we mean right now," said Rivers. "We don't have time to say, 'Hey, can you come over here for a second, I'd like to talk to you about getting out to J.J. Reddick, who's wide open.' "

Reddick happened to be walking by at that moment -- drawing laughter from the media as Rivers said hello in the middle of his example -- but Rivers suggested that it's a hard line to straddle and any instruction was open to player interpretation.

But Rivers also noted Orlando was in the NBA Finals last season.

"[Van Gundy's] coaching style is just fine," said Rivers. "Why change? They were in the Finals last year. I wouldn't change that at all."

Rivers confirmed that he's had players come to him to try to sort out differences and their perception that he was coming down hard on them without justification. Rivers stressed that the key for him was having the same agenda for all his players and -- even if personal feelings didn't mesh -- he wanted the team on the same page.

At that moment, Rasheed Wallace walked by and screamed at Rivers for creating a "fire hazard" by clogging up the hallway. Rivers didn't miss a beat.

"It's the opposite on this team," he joked. "I go to Rasheed and say, 'Can you be a little calmer? Can you be nicer today?' That hasn't worked yet, either."

Despite practicing this week, Celtics guard Tony Allen says there's still lingering pain in his injured right ankle and he's not close to returning to game action.

"Right now, I've got this pain in my ankle," said Allen. "If I can get this pain calmed down, I'll be alright. I'm moving pretty well, pretty quick. But over long periods of time, it starts to feel different. Once the pain calms down, I'll be back to going where I need to be."

Allen underwent arthroscopic ankle surgery and posterior tibial tendon repair during the offseason, but might have pushed himself back too quickly. He aggravated the injury in a preseason game against the Knicks on Oct. 9 and only this week returned to a full practice workload.

Asked if he was taking his return slow to ensure he doesn't re-injure himself, Allen said, "Most definitely. I've never had an ankle injury to this point, it's something new to me, so I'm being very cautious about my return."

Allen, in the final year of a two-year contract, said there's no swelling in the ankle, just pain that he hopes subsides. In the meantime, he said he's keeping busy by cheering on his teammates, watching film, and continuing to get treatment.

BOSTON -- A tremendous amount has been made about the struggles of Celtics guard Rajon Rondo at the free throw line to start the 2009-10 season. Probably too much for someone who's made less than 10 trips to the stripe.

But when you're shooting 25 percent (4 of 16 overall) and you're the only one of the regulars shooting below 62 percent, you stand out a bit. For Rondo, it clearly hasn't been the charity stripe, it's been the languish line.

So there was Rondo on the Garden floor, more than three hours before tip-off Friday night, going through a free throw clinic with assistant coach Armond Hill. Numerous times, Rondo seemed to breeze through consecutive makes, then would grimace when one came up short, clanging off the front iron.

For those concerned, Rondo certainly wasn't shooting 25 percent in warm-ups. Check out this Twitter video to watch Rondo close out his training session with three straight makes.

Though players on the team said all week it wasn't their place to approach Rondo and offer help, the fourth-year guard eventually sought out Ray Allen for advice.

"I just explained to him what to think when you release the ball to the basket," said Allen. "I told him that a lot of your misses are line drives and -- even Paul [Pierce] when he misses, line drives them, we all do -- so I said, shoot the ball up in the air and give it a chance to always go in. Use the loft on the ball, get it in the air.

"Some of it, too, is the adrenaline is flowing. It's pumping so hard that you gotta calm yourself down and breathe, get that wind out of you. Sometimes you're so caught up in your wind, you shoot it and get too much on the ball while breathing out."

Why did Allen wait for Rondo to approach him?

"I want to help everyone, but you gotta want to shoot better," said Allen. "If you need me to be in the gym, I'll be there... but you have to want to be coached."

Celtics coach Doc Rivers talked last week about how Rondo's offseason work with shooting coach Mark Price, which altered the way Rondo shot the ball overall, might be hindering him at the line early in the season.

Regardless, given Rondo's fearless drives to the basket that often end with him standing at the line, the Celtics know he must improve his consistency there. Lest opponents take up a Hack-a-Rondo approach.