DENVER -- If you told me before these playoffs that one No. 1 seed would roll to four straight wins, while the other would be tied at 2-2 thanks to two road losses in a raucous environment, I would have found that very believable.
But if you would have told me the Los Angeles Lakers would be the ones sweeping while the Boston Celtics were knotted up not so much.
Yet it's the Lakers who advanced to the second round in a series that was surprisingly easy. In Monday's Game 4, they used a dominating closing stretch from Kobe Bryant to hold off a Denver Nuggets team that, it must be said, didn't quit, winning 107-101 to complete the sweep.
While Bryant made most of the big plays, he was in that position because this revamped Lakers team has become a lot more than just the Kobe Show. That was evident throughout Monday's contest, as Bryant was at something less than his best for the first 42 minutes but the Lakers still held a lead, due to strong efforts from Pau Gasol, Lamar Odom and the gang.
In particular, L.A.'s exquisite ball movement was a dominant theme throughout the series. This was a pretty good passing team even on opening night, but with Kobe buying in and the midseason trade for Gasol putting another deft passer in the mix, they've taken it to another level.
"Our personality has always been as a good passing team when everybody's been healthy," Bryant said on Sunday. "This year, bringing in Derek [Fisher], bringing in Pau, just heightened the personality of this ballclub. We're all great passers."
"Pau really opens things up for a lot of players," said Lakers coach Phil Jackson. "He has a great reach, and at his height can turn and face the basket and see over the top of the defense and create multiple opportunities for our players. And I think his willingness to pass the ball and his unselfishness has been very infectious. "
The result of that infection is twofold -- not only is it less incumbent on Kobe to create all the time, but he gets fewer urges to go off the reservation and try to win the game by himself.
Not that he can't do it -- the final six minutes Monday were a tour de force at both ends. In that time he scored 14 points, blocked a shot, stole a pass and drew two offensive fouls.
He made a 3-pointer and a driving layup basket to break open a tie game, then hit a jumper over Kenyon Martin when the Nuggets briefly took a one-point lead. He turned his attention to defense and drew the fifth and sixth fouls on Martin by charging out hard and drawing illegal screens, knocking his primary defender out of the game.
Back on offense, he drew the fifth and sixth fouls on his next defender, Carmelo Anthony, by attacking off the dribble to draw blocking fouls -- removing the Nuggets' best scoring threat. His runner in the lane with 40.7 seconds left sucked the air out of Denver's final charge, and his physical D on J.R. Smith and subsequent steal with 18.2 seconds left sealed it. And just for good measure, he rejected Linas Kleiza's 3-point attempt at the buzzer.
"Is he good or what?" lamented a Nuggets official afterward. "You can talk about other guys, but he's the best."
As awesome as his stretch run was, it's easier for him to pull it off when opponents know they must account for the other four players (and know the Lakers' passers will punish them for any openings left).
Look at a couple of the other plays in the final minutes, for instance -- when Bryant gave up the ball and the other Lakers punished the Nuggets by exploiting openings.
With 2:38 left in a one-point game, Denver sent two defenders at Kobe on a pick-and-roll. He swung it to Odom, who found a wide-open Luke Walton in the corner for a 3-pointer and a 100-96 lead. Denver would never have the ball within one possession the rest of the game.
And with 22.4 seconds left in a two-point game, we saw a similar scene. Kobe drew two defenders and gave it up to Odom again. This time a defender rotated out to Walton a second too soon and left the middle open, and Odom found a wide-open Gasol for a dunk.
"It takes a lot of burden off me," Bryant said of his new friends. "That's something that teams have noticed because they don't know how to defend us anymore. It's me moving the ball to them, and them taking a shot and knocking it down or moving it to somebody and getting a better shot. We're just trying to capitalize on the defense as much as possible, just trying to be unselfish."
For the series, the Lakers assisted on 112 of 169 field goals, or 66.2 percent -- even better than their already splendid 61.7 percent mark in the regular season. Basically, the Nuggets never really had an answer for how to defend Kobe while still accounting for the Lakers' other threats.
Now it's somebody else's problem. The Lakers advance to play either Houston or Utah in the next round, and undoubtedly will be rooting for the Rockets to extend the series on Tuesday. Interestingly, Jackson noted his admiration for Houston's achievement during the Lakers' practice Sunday.
"I just think Houston's played beyond reasonable [expectation] with inexperienced talent," Jackson said. "Not lesser talent, but inexperienced talent, at a very high level, where they really have a team spirit that's great to watch. They came back in [Game 4] and lost it obviously, [but] they put themselves in a position to have a chance. I don't think there's any doubt that that team's going to play hard and do a good job."
Of course, the Nuggets played hard, too, and they still were left with few answers for a Lakers team that puts so much pressure on opposing defenses.
"We just got beat by a better team," said Nuggets guard Allen Iverson.
But at least Denver left with some pride intact after being the aggressors for much of the night. "My wish would be that we could have had four games like tonight," said Nuggets coach George Karl.
Instead, they'll have to spend the summer contemplating how to end a half-decade-long string of first-round exits and how to deal with the Lakers' multiple threats if these two teams meet again next postseason.
John Hollinger writes for ESPN Insider. To e-mail him, click here.