I think I’m not terribly worried about the Celtics closing it out, but that’s weighted by how devastating it would be if they didn’t win. For so many reasons, this is an incredibly likable team and has improbably grown more and more so over the last three years. And then last year when Tatum rolled his ankle to start G7 ECF, it was like, FFS, all the time living and dying with this team for that to happen?? If they lose this year at this point, it will be more like when the Empire blew up Alderaan.
That said, I think the people who point out that from the outside, we’d think the Celtics should have this make a solid point. It took three games for the Mavs to make significant enough adjustments. I posed the question in the Public Discourse thread about what the other elite athletes of the playoffs must think of hearing that the Celtics didn’t play anyone or that Dallas somehow slid in by luck. The Mavericks are a very good professional basketball team; we should not be surprised that they made adjustments. So the concern becomes: Can the Celtics make sufficient adjustments in response or have the Mavs decisively “solved” the Celtics in some way that cannot be countered?
The latter strikes me as highly unlikely. Like, I’m not sure that’s how basketball works, and CJM has shown himself to have a very plastic and adaptable basketball mind along with a starting five who can all do a lot of things, so the tools and resources are there. In this vein, one thing that jumped out at a lesser basketball mind such as my own was that the Celtics were hesitating; like, there would be a slight hesitation on receiving what would normally be a catch and shoot, just long enough for the defender to close, so they’d often have to make another pass instead (or take the contested shot). Well, we’ve all seen the numbers on C&S versus other shots, especially from three. That hesitation would seem to be a function of being taken off guard.
I don’t expect them to be taken off guard again tonight, not by the same adjustments anyway. And I do expect the Celtics to have adjustments of their own. But we’ll see; I’m excited to see.
Is it game time yet??