They shoot too many 3-pointers. They have no point guard. Their major offseason acquisition has been utterly underwhelming. Their center is really a power forward and their power forward is really a power forward lite. They have the bare-bones minimum for personnel as their soon-to-be former owner goes out the door with his pockets stuffed with cash.

Geez, does it get any better than this for the Boston Celtics? They might even have won 20 games by now had not management been fitted for a financial straitjacket. As it is, they're 18-9 an a half-game behind the 19-9 Nets for the top spot in the Atlantic Division going into their Christmas Night matchup and, given all that's transpired, it's basically a testament to the will and skill of one man -- coach Jim O'Brien.

	Only one NBA coach has had to work with just a 12-man roster this season: Jim O'Brien.

Hey, ESPN the Magazine told us before the season started that O'Brien was their choice as the Power Coach and even said he could turn around Vin Baker. While this may be the season of miracles, turning around the suddenly calcified Baker may be a stretch. Other than that, however, O'Brien has the Celtics near the top of the conference once again and given what happened over the summer, how many would have envisioned that when Christmas rolled along?

Yes, they have benefited from a schedule that, to be charitable, has been rather benign. They have played as many games against the Bulls (four) as they have against New Orleans, Indiana, New Jersey, Detroit and Philadelphia combined. Of those other five Eastern Conference contenders, the Celtics have played only one of them -- the Sixers -- on the road. The Christmas matchup with Jersey will mark their second foray into inhospitable conference waters.

They've played 27 games so far and more than a third of them -- 10 -- have been against Chicago, New York, Cleveland and Miami. Of their 27 games, 16 of them have been at home. In reality, given whom they've played and where they've played, you could make a case that they probably should have an even better record. Antoine Walker thinks so. "We should only have four losses right now," he said. Indeed, six of the Celtics nine losses have come to teams with losing records, including two to the Bulls.

But the fact that they are 18-9 -- and 7-4 on the road -- is due mainly to O'Brien's handiwork. He immediately recognized that the team needed to focus on defense and brought in Dick Harter last season to help in that area. But, even more important, he had the players buy into his plan.

"One of the hardest things to do as a coach is to get great offensive players to also play defense," said an admiring Doc Rivers, the Orlando Magic's head coach. "Jim was able to do that. I like the fact that they've turned it around. I hate the fact that they did because they're now a much better team."

It wasn't supposed to be this way, at least that was the conventional wisdom following last summer's roster reconfiguration. Owner Paul Gaston refused to authorize anything other than an insulting, certain-to-be-refused offer to Rodney Rogers, the free agent who had been such a huge part of the Celtics' surprising playoff run. So the Celtics gambled big-time, making a five-player deal with Seattle which brought in Baker and Shammond Williams, who couldn't even get minutes as a backup point guard. Gone in the deal was Kenny Anderson, their point guard who played a big role last season. Rogers took New Jersey's money.

The deal left O'Brien without a true point guard. It also left him and the team with a financial millstone in Baker. But O'Brien simply went back to his trusty clipboard and starting figuring out how he could continue to win with no point guard.

He decided to place even more of the offense in the hands of his two stars, Walker and Paul Pierce. It's no secret that they not only are 1-2 in scoring on the team, but also are 1-2 in assists and 1-2 in rebounds. (Pierce leads in points and rebounds; Walker leads in assists.)

They are the de facto point guards. The guys who masquerade as point guards, Williams and Tony Delk, are long-distance specialists who, more often than not, stand outside the 3-point arc and wait for a pass from Pierce and Walker. O'Brien likes players who shoot threes and Delk and Williams do that. So does Walker, who leads the league in attempts for the second straight year. The Celtics as a team have a Secretariat-in-the-Belmont lead over second-place Dallas in 3-point attempts per game (27.3-19.8). They hoist it up without even a thought, encouraged by the coach who sees it as a potent and useful weapon.

"I made a decision when I took this job that for the Boston Celtics to have the best chance to win, this was how we're going to have to play," O'Brien said. "Last year we got to the Eastern Conference finals."

OK, so he (temporarily) solved the point guard problem. Anderson already is saying that he'll be missed when the playoffs come and it turns into Smashmouth Hoops. We'll see. It would be fortuitous for the head coach if a real point guard came along, but Gaston won't let the team sign anyone, keeping their roster stuck at 12 players. The Celtics are the only team in the league with a roster of 12. That may change next month when the new ownership group takes over.

"Our roster is what it is," O'Brien said.

	Publicly, O'Brien has had nothing but good things to say about Baker; the next time he rips one of his own will be the first time. But, privately, you'd love to be a fly on the wall to see his reaction when he pores over videotape and sees the 6-foot-11 Baker unable to finish a layup or dunk. It's happened. A lot.

That roster starts with Pierce and Walker, who in addition to doing almost everything for the Celtics are also among the league leaders in minutes. Walker tops the loop in minutes per game (43.2) and the Celtics are one of three teams -- the Hornets and Rockets are the others -- with two players averaging 40 or more minutes a game. Pierce checks in at 40.5.

These two lads have been incredibly durable. Pierce has not missed a game in almost three years; his start on Christmas will be his 228th straight. And he's taken a beating lately, losing parts of two teeth in a collision with sculpted Suns rookie Amare Stoudemire and then getting into a dustup with Zydrunas Ilgauskas, which resulted in an ejection. Pierce is fearless; he leads the league in free throw attempts and conversions. Walker, meanwhile, has missed only two games in the last three-plus seasons; one for his grandmother's funeral and another in a meaningless, regular-season finale.

And, lest we forget, the roster also includes Baker, who is off, statistically, to the worst year of his NBA career. Everyone wondered how O'Brien would handle Baker and the coach has handled it thusly: bringing Baker off the bench for 18 minutes a game, which partly explains Baker's meager contributions (5.6 points, 4.3 rebounds.) Publicly, O'Brien has had nothing but good things to say about Baker; the next time he rips one of his own will be the first time. But, privately, you'd love to be a fly on the wall to see his reaction when he pores over videotape and sees the 6-foot-11 Baker unable to finish a layup or dunk. It's happened. A lot.

Baker is, for now, a backup center. O'Brien said all along that Tony Battie, one of the more underated players in the league, was still his center. Nothing has changed. In fact, in two recent Boston losses, Battie missed one entirely due to a league suspension and missed 37 minutes of the other when he was sent home with the flu. Baker could not step in and make a difference.

Fortunately for the Celtics, the same cannot be said for the head coach. They're atop their division, playing on Christmas and back on the NBA radar screen. That hasn't happened by chance. It's happened because Jim O'Brien made it happen.

Peter May, who covers the NBA for the Boston Globe, is a regular contributor to ESPN.com.