Boston’s Kevin Garnett shoots over Detroit’s Tayshaun Prince, left, and forward Rasheed Wallace.

AP / Gary Malerba

DETROIT — Detroit All-Star Richard Hamilton had his right arm in a sling 48 hours before last night’s Eastern Conference finals game with Boston.

He suffered an elbow strain, an injury serious enough for him to get x-rays, which turned up negative.

Nobody would have blamed him for sitting out last night, but he didn’t.

He did his best to play through the pain and he did it for one simple reason — the dream. The dream to win an NBA title.

It’s a dream that every NBA player has. He’s already earned one NBA championship ring, but he wants another.

So he played.

The Celtics expected him to.

Most of them would have played too if they were in the same situation — one loss away from the end of their season.

One loss away from their dream ending.

“We don’t get this opportunity too many times in our career,” Boston captain Paul Pierce said. “You’ve got to go out there and play like it’s [your] last [game] because you never know when it’s going to happen again.”

Pierce’s teammates echoed the statement. They say that they are going to continue to play no matter how fatigued or how banged up they get.

“You’ve just got to go out and play like it’s your last game,” Boston forward James Posey said.

“The only thing on my mind is getting a win, getting a step closer to the NBA Finals,” Pierce said. “I don’t think fatigue is going to be a factor.”

Boston coach Doc Rivers said that the Celtics don’t practice as hard in the playoffs, which gives their bodies time to recover between games.

“I feel they look great,” Rivers said of his team. “I mean, I haven’t heard anyone talking about fatigue or anything like that. You know, during the playoffs, you don’t practice as much. You know, you do more prep stuff as far as walk-throughs, so you don’t have that grind on your body.

“I think they’re fine. This every-other-day routine has been good, very good for us, good flow for us. So no, I don’t think it’s been a problem at all.”

Hamilton said that there was no way he was going to miss last night’s game.

“This is it. It’s one and done right now,” Hamilton said before last night’s game as to the reason why he wanted to play.

Not even his father, Richard, wanted Hamilton to miss the game.

“I look at it as a situation where, I talked to my dad and he said, ‘just spit on it.’ ” Hamilton said. “Usually when you talk to your dad about something like that he’s like, ‘All right, take your time.’ But he was like, ‘No man, just spit on it. We’re at war right now. You don’t have a choice to sit down or anything like that.’ ”

Hamilton said that his plan wasn’t going to go out on the court and be a decoy. He wanted to do everything in his power to help his team win.

“I told the guys not to look at me as a handicap out there,” Hamilton said.

“Knowing Rip, he’s going to contribute as much as he can,” Pistons forward Tayshaun Prince said.

Hamilton hurt his arm with eight seconds left in Game Five on Wednesday when he was battling for a rebound with Boston guard Ray Allen.

“My arm got stuck when we were wrestling to try to get that last rebound,” Hamilton said. “My arm got stuck and my hand went down and my elbow came up and I felt something pop. I thought I could just shake it off, but I couldn’t do it.”

Allen said that he and Hamilton were battling for the loose ball and Hamilton got hurt. Allen said he wasn’t trying to hurt Hamilton.

“Everybody saw the play,” Allen said. “He was lashing out towards me.”

Hamilton had been icing his arm and getting electronic stimulation while working out with Detroit strength and conditioning coach Arnie Kander prior to last night’s game.

The heart and determination that Hamilton displayed to play through the pain shows how much winning an NBA title means to NBA players.

Boston’s Big Three have zero NBA championship rings between them. They hope to change that by the end of the season even if that means playing through more pain than they’ve ever had to play through in their life.

Next Game

To be

determined.

roblee@projo.com