Worried yet?

Clearly the Celtics entered the NBA Eastern Conference playoffs under the delusion that Round One was a best-of-three, straight out of the day of short shorts and three-to-make-two and highlight-film soundtrack music by Giorgio Moroder.

Well, congratulations, guys. You’ve earned yourselves a miniseries.

It’s difficult embracing the myth that no seven-game set truly begins until the higher seed loses a game. OK, in this case, ‘difficult’ has morphed into ‘impossible,’ simply because we know the ingredients that hold together the hosts.

Boston has banked its precious present in the fragile minds and unproven hearts and stomachs of Kevin Garnett, Ray Allen and Paul Pierce. That feels infinitely more secure than a 2-2 tie with Wally Szczerbiak, Jeff Green and Antoine Walker sulking about the locker room, but it’s still worth noting that the trio in question has a collective 30-year history of leading their teams a game shy of the conference semifinals.

We entered this chemistry experiment, eyes open and teeth gritted, knowing that it could spontaneously combust in Game No. 6, or No. 86, or never.

The mad scientist wearing the white coat is one Glenn “Doc” Rivers, whose playoff claim to fame is that he knows how to dish the ball to Dominique Wilkins. Rivers’ coaching resume from the second week of April forward is enough to make Flip Saunders stick out his chest. Doc is a point guard who understands a point guard’s need for consistency and confidence, yet he continues to pester promising Rajon Rondo by allotting some of his most meaningful minutes to 71-year-old Sam Cassell. Stop it, already.

Mike Woodson has his Hawks on the cusp of a ridiculous upset in part because he has the chops to give his young thoroughbreds the freedom to sprinkle a few egregious mistakes among their flashes of brilliance. The net result is not playing scared, a skill the Celtics seemed to learn, master and maximize in March. Too bad nobody ever measures that second digit on your left hand for championship bling until June.

Atlanta’s other strategy is the one every overmatched opponent since the Founding Fathers has employed. Become the gnat in the tormentor’s ear, the missing button on his shirt, the spammer peddling 50 different discount meds in his e-mail. Trash talk like Freddie Mitchell and Rory Sabbatini. Throw rabbit punches like Mike Tyson.

None of it usually works, because the overwhelming favorite is secure enough in its manhood to laugh where appropriate and address it all with the unspoken chant of “Scooooooore-board!” Anybody remember the way the Glory Days Celtics used to snicker and swat away the Milwaukee Bucks in three or four straight games whenever Jack Sikma, Sidney Moncrief and Paul Mokeski tried acting tough? Or gave the same treatment to Bill Laimbeer, Dennis Rodman and Joe Dumars, before they were good enough to be worthy of sharing the Pistons’ floor with Isiah Thomas?

Instead, we’ve been treated to Pierce’s “menacing gestures.” We’ve winced while Garnett allowed something named Zaza Pachulia (isn’t that the stuff Deadheads used to wear on 23-day road trips through the Midwest so they wouldn’t have to take showers?) to burrow under his skin like a Lyme tick.

The Celtics absolutely deserve to be playing for dear life tonight at the Garden. And let’s be frank ‘n’ earnest here: If Atlanta steals Game 5, I am willing to fly the red-eye to Vegas and wager at least the first three digits of my married, filing jointly with qualifying child economic stimulus that Game 6 is a gimme for the Hawks.

Don’t misunderstand. My pick remains Boston in six, but that’s quite the little crash landing from saying Boston in four, guffawing heartily, tipping back a pint of Sam and getting ready to switch over to the Sox as soon as the C’s are up by 20. The East’s top seed has been strip-searched before a national television audience and exposed for what it is: A meek facsimile of that team on the other side of the bracket that wears a pony prod across its chest.

Funny, because this team could use a kick in the flank right about now. And if the Celtics can’t stand up and be counted tonight against a No. 8 team that won a whopping dozen road games all season, the thought of dethroning those Spurs will be seen for what it probably was all along.

Utterly laughable. If only because it beats crying.

Kalle Oakes is a staff writer. His e-mail is [email protected].