BOSTON – On Sunday night time, the Celtics have been on prime of the world, holding a 3-1 collection lead over their rival Philadelphia 76ers, geared up with a totally wholesome roster and on the heels of a spectacular 56-win common season.
Recent off a 32-point offensive masterpiece, Payton Pritchard sat on the podium and mirrored on the largest recreation of his playoff profession.
Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown had simply completed their 119th playoff recreation as teammates.
Jordan Walsh was rising as top-of-the-line defensive stoppers of the playoffs.
Within the locker room after the sport, Brown randomly dubbed Baylor Scheierman “Huge Shot Bob” with a smile.
The vibes, as the children say, have been excessive. And, the Celtics gave the impression to be at the start of what felt like an inevitably lengthy playoff journey.
As an alternative, they by no means gained one other recreation. Six days later, the season is over.
On the Celtics locker room at TD Backyard, Brown stares straight forward. The gamers are silent. Tatum is in avenue garments. Derrick White is combating tears.
How did all of it go to flames within the blink of an eye fixed?
The large-picture, non-technical reply is: that’s simply sports activities. The unpredictability of basketball is what makes it nice. It’s what retains us watching. It’s additionally what makes the heartbreak so sudden, so painful.
The identical Orlando Magic staff that misplaced to the Celtics’ bench unit got here out and assumed a 3-1 collection lead over the Detroit Pistons just a few weeks later.
And, just some days after that, that very same Magic staff scored a shocking 19 factors in the complete second half of their Recreation 6. How can one make sense of that?
The Celtics have been, and are, conscious of the ridiculous unpredictability of this sport.
After they took a 1-0 lead within the Philly collection, Joe Mazzulla’s media availability was stuffed with questions on how nice a job he’d performed this season, about his incoming Coach of the 12 months award.
He, as he’s performed all yr, deflected the reward.
“This might all change 24 hours from now, to the place we’re having totally different conversations,” Mazzulla stated. “So it’s a part of simply the angle of being rooted in one thing, whatever the atmosphere round you on a 24-hour cycle.”
Sadly for him, these phrases aged properly: the Celtics’ season, a season that was as particular because it was surprising, is over.
The bleeding started final Tuesday night time, when the Celtics received crushed within the second half of Recreation 5, and missed 14 straight discipline targets to lose the sport. A 13-point third-quarter lead changed into a blowout loss.
In Recreation 6, they have been outworked in entrance of a raucous 76ers crowd that introduced again the “We Received Boston” chants.
And in Recreation 7, all of the mileage had begun to catch as much as Tatum. After lacking the final quarter-hour of Recreation 6, he was a late add to the harm report on Saturday, with left knee tightness.
Two hours earlier than tip-off, he was dominated out.
“He got here in at the moment with knee discomfort,” Mazzulla stated. “We made the choice for him.”
That meant the Celtics needed to come into Saturday’s recreation with a very totally different look.
Mazzulla made the choice to bench two starters — Neemias Queta and Sam Hauser – in favor of Ron Harper Jr. and Luka Garza. Neither man ended up enjoying important minutes — Harper Jr. performed 4 minutes, and Garza performed 9 — however that gorgeous resolution set the tone for what finally ended up being a wild Recreation 7.
Pritchard stated he wasn’t stunned by that new-look beginning 5. The Celtics, in spite of everything,
The Celtics trailed by as many as 15 within the first quarter and by as many as 18 within the fourth, however every time, they clawed their method again into the sport, finally slicing the deficit to 1 with two minutes to spare.
However, identical to they did in Recreation 5, they went chilly. Within the ultimate 5 minutes of the sport, they missed 10 straight discipline targets, together with a wide-open Pritchard three, and a number of Jaylen Brown middies.
Recreation 7, nonetheless, was in some ways totally different from that Recreation 5 collapse. The Celtics went 10 guys deep, counting on 13 first-half Hugo Gonzalez minutes. For the primary time since Recreation 1, they recorded fewer turnovers than their opponents. They have been undoubtedly the harder-playing staff. Neemias Queta, who struggled by means of the collection’ first six video games, put collectively a masterful efficiency, tallying 17 factors on 7-8 capturing.
Maybe in flip, the TD Backyard crowd was the loudest it’s been all yr.
Brown wished that the Celtics had performed that frenetic tempo all collection, earlier than Recreation 7.
“Tonight, I want we performed that model and trusted that model extra even all through the playoffs,” he stated. “Even by means of wins and thru losses. Clearly, it’s not at all times the best resolution, however I want that model for our staff was how we empowered the remainder of our group, and also you noticed tonight how everyone got here out, they usually performed their tail off. I want we trusted that extra.”
Hindsight is 20-20, however dozens of followers at TD Backyard echoed that sentiment.
“I’m simply completely satisfied to be watching this staff,” one fan instructed me at halftime, emphasizing how a lot he appreciated the truth that the Keep Prepared gamers have been getting a shot.
“I’m so grateful to be with this group,” Brown stated. “This group is superior. I had a enjoyable yr. That is in all probability one in every of my most enjoyable years enjoying basketball. It wasn’t at all times excellent. It wasn’t at all times analytically or aesthetically pleasing. However we gained a variety of basketball video games, and other people might see the grit and the battle that we performed with each single night time. Tonight was an instance of that. We left all of it on the market, we performed a rookie, we performed no matter, and we scrapped all the best way to the top. Simply got here up a pair performs brief.”
Payton Pritchard’s perspective was all in regards to the huge image, about how the 2025-2026 season could possibly be used as a constructing block for the longer term, simply because the pre-2024 seasons culminated in a championship.
“Simply since you don’t win a championship one yr, doesn’t imply it didn’t construct for the subsequent championship,” Pritchard stated. “So, once we gained Banner 18, 4 years earlier than that, we misplaced 4 straight — misplaced to Miami, misplaced within the finals. So these might need been disappointing years, however possibly these led to the championship. So, that’s how I take a look at it.”
It’s a good looking mindset. Nonetheless, it’s tough to instantly make sense of the truth that a season that had so many stunning highs ended with sudden devastation.
As White exited the TD Backyard parquet with a towel over his head, it was onerous to consider that lower than per week in the past, the Celtics have been returning to Boston with a 3-1 lead, seemingly on prime of the world, with a complete playoff run forward of them, a wholesome Jayson Tatum, and title aspirations.
That’s the cruelest a part of sports activities.
