On Friday night, Boston Celtics coach Brad Stevens spent much of his pre-match press conference reiterating his commitment to the team and making it clear that he was not leaving to take over at Indiana University. When he sat down again to speak to reporters a few hours later, the mood was not so cheerful.
After struggling with a 15-point deficit to take the lead for a brief period, the Celtics collapsed in the home stretch and lost to the Sacramento Kings 107 to 96. This was the third straight loss, and the fourth in five games since the All-Star range. As a result, they are now back at 0.500 in 20-21, and clinging to eighth place in the Eastern Conference.
Stevens, unsurprisingly, did not like the result or the recent trend. He said he believes in his group, but wants them to be more resilient and engaged with each other.
“I think we need to be more engaged with each other”, Stevens said. “I think teams are fragile things, guys are trying – and they’re all really good … I can’t say enough good things about [the players]. That’s why I believe it is there. That’s why I think our roof is better than what we play – because I believe in who we have. But we have to do this together. This is the end result. “
“Fun often follows victory,” continued Stevens. “But what comes first: winning or doing difficult things?”
This was a difficult and disjointed season for the Celtics, who were short of manpower almost the entire way. The constant shuffling of rotations and functions undoubtedly made it difficult to find and maintain a rhythm, and this was obvious in his game and in the results.
But external factors do not fully justify some of his struggles. There are a ton of top talent on this team – Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown made them one of only six teams with multiple All-Stars – and Stevens noted that his cap is still quite high. Unfortunately, the floor is also very low.
Part of that depends on the players and the technical team to find out. We’ve already seen Stevens’ quotes and the players also gave their opinion after the game. “I didn’t do a good job of leading this team,” said Brown. “I lose sleep over it.” Kemba Walker added: “At the end of the day, we have to come together, man … People need to sacrifice certain things. We have to put our pride aside and find out.”
President Danny Ainge also bears the burden of making some adjustments to the March 25 negotiation deadline. Some of its peripheral movements in recent years have not worked and, as a result, the Celtics’ supporting cast is inconsistent and inadequate. to praise the best skills of the stars. They have a massive switch exception through the Gordon Hayward saga, and adding an additional score and a wing shot threat would go a long way toward solving some of the Celtics’ problems.
If Ainge can make something happen in the trading market, or the players currently in the locker room adjust and find things out internally, perhaps the Celtics can still make some noise in the East. But if they remain on their current trajectory, it is difficult to see this happening.