Another terrible piece of news: The Boston Celtics received another Turffest heartbreaking piece of news, as the manager and a star player have confirmed with tears down their eyes.
The management and a prominent player of the Boston Celtics have revealed with tears in their eyes that the team has gotten yet another painful piece of awful news.
Due to a left quad contusion, Boston Celtics power forward/center Kristaps Porzingis was unable to play in Sunday’s 140-88 victory over the Golden State Warriors.
In 446 career games (445 starts), he has averaged 19.7 points, 7.8 rebounds, 1.8 assists, and 1.8 blocks with the New York Knicks, Dallas Mavericks, Wizards, and Celtics. In the 2015 NBA draft, New York chose him with the fourth overall choice.
Then, their 22-point advantage over the Cleveland Cavaliers in the fourth quarter vanished in the span of a single glance. The Cavaliers successfully disputed a foul call on Darius Garland during the play, and after a Jayson Tatum fadeaway shot went long, Cleveland defeated Boston 105-104 to end the team’s league-high 11-game winning streak.
After the game, Jaylen Brown declared, “I think we are a much better team than we showed today.” “Today was merely a loss of perspective.
It was more of a mindset issue than an X-O one because we had the game and then settled down. We simply need to be a more militant and disciplined team. That’s not who we were. We sensed that today, as we always do, and I believe that’s what allowed them to rejoin the game.
“We handled the ball with too much carelessness and a slightly too relaxed mentality. We did not mean to cause offense. We sort of allowed guys to develop tendencies that we were meant to break. We surrendered offensive rebounds; these kinds of things are simply a mentality.”
It didn’t seem like any of those things would matter for the majority of the game. After hitting 50% of its three-pointers in the first three quarters, Boston had a comfortable 16-point lead going into the fourth quarter, which grew to 22 points when Tatum made a putback layup with nine minutes remaining. Cleveland, on the other hand, was playing without Donovan Mitchell and Max Strus due to knee injuries, and Evan Mobley had sprained his ankle late in the third quarter.
Then came the fourth quarter. Boston was 0-for-8 from beyond the arc, while Cavaliers player Dean Wade outscored the Celtics 20-17 in the last quarter while going 5-for-5 from beyond the arc and 7-for-7 from the field, including a crucial tip-dunk off a missed shot by Garland with 19.1 seconds remaining.
Wade grinned and responded, “Rank’s pretty high,” when asked where that quarter stood in terms of his own achievements. “Very high. It was satisfying. The rim appeared extremely large.
In his postgame media session, Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla brought up that offensive rebound as well as a few other mental blunders and unintentional errors Boston committed in the closing moments of the game.
After Wade’s tip slam, there was the game’s last play. After Tatum took the ball into the frontcourt and Derrick White set up a pick for him to get the much smaller Garland switched onto him, Mazzulla decided to attempt a challenging stepback jumper on the right side of the lane, but it was a long shot.
When Garland was called for a foul, it appeared as though Tatum (15-for-46 in clutch situations this season) would be helped out. However, the call was overturned when Cavaliers coach J.B. Bickerstaff contested it. Later, crew chief Zach Zarba told a pool reporter that Garland’s contact with Tatum’s leg was unintentional since Tatum had kicked it out.
Garland stated, “I knew the leg kick was kind of in play.” “My shin still kind of hurts from it, so I’m glad it was overturned.”
Tatum disagreed, although he did acknowledge that he ought to have entered a play sooner rather than waiting until the last second. With less than five seconds left, Mazzulla said he attempted to call a timeout, but the referees were unaware of his attempt.
“It was unfortunate,” said Tatum, who finished the quarter with one of his nine points. “They often say the game isn’t won or lost on the final play, but I thought I got fouled. We were in that situation because of a number of things we executed poorly in the fourth quarter.”
He was not in error. It was only the fourth time this season that Boston failed to hit a three-in-a quarter. The team’s eight misses without a make from three in the fourth equaled the most by the Celtics in a quarter this year. The Celtics were outscored by 17, which was their worst point differential in a fourth quarter this season, while the club scored its fewest points in a quarter this season—17.
Brown stated that it was crucial to use this as a lesson in what not to do as they go into their probable NBA Finals preview against the Denver Nuggets on Thursday night, having just seen their league-leading win streak snapped.
“This day counts,” Brown stated. “It doesn’t matter if everyone wants to discard it; we need to examine the movie and deal with certain issues. It all comes down to your behavior. Your mindset is crucial. Additionally, you cannot waste any time or possessions while playing the game.
Thus, today is significant. We must examine that.
