The Front Row: Last five minutes

DAD KNOWS BEST: With the Los Angeles Lakers up 21 after the first quarter, my dad arrived home from work and asked if the Boston Celtics would make a comeback.

“I doubt it,” I replied. “[Kevin] Garnett is off and the Celtics look uninspired.”

He looked at me and uttered the same eight-word phrase he uses to describe every NBA game he’s ever watched.

“It doesn’t matter until the last five minutes.”

The score with 4:56 remaining in last night’s Game 4? Lakers 83, Celtics 80.

Los Angeles (Lamar Odom, in particular) threw haymakers to open the game, charging out to a seemingly insurmountable lead.

The Celtics (James Posey, in particular) came roaring back, proving why my dad thinks the first 43 minutes of most NBA games are useless.

Boston ended up winning in one of the most impressive comebacks in playoff history, thanks to some terrific execution on both ends and Los Angeles’ abysmal crunch-time performance.

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‘THE DESTORYER’ RETURNS: Another fight, another anonymous opponent for David Lopez (34-12, 22 KOs).

Only two months after his fifth-round destruction of Ryan Davis on the Joe Calzaghe versus Bernard Hopkins undercard in Las Vegas, the Nogales middleweight returns to the ring against undefeated, yet untested Michael Walker (18-0-2, 12 KOs) tonight on a Telefutura main event.

Lopez will be gunning for his 11th consecutive win after suffering that heartbreaking 12th-round KO loss to Fulgencio Zuniga on Jan. 6, 2005.

With the exception of Epifanio Mendoza, Lopez has yet to take on a fighter of consequence, despite charging to fourth on the WBC’s middleweight rankings.

Walker, 29, has spent the majority of his career battling in six- and eight-round fights. His first 10-rounder came nearly four months ago when he battled an over-the-hill

Antwun Echols to a majority draw.

This will be Lopez’s first trip back to Fort Worth, Texas — the site where he claimed the NABF middleweight belt via seventh-round KO against the aforementioned Mendoza.

Check next Sunday’s Green Valley News for results and a list of possible opponents as “The Destroyer” moves forward.

nprevenas@gvnews.com | 547-9747