Celts can’t escape hole
Follow up troubling ‘L’ with same effort
ATLANTA — You will have to give the Celtics credit for making a game of it at the end, but ultimately the hole they dug for themselves was too deep from which to escape.
For most of the 123-116 loss to the Hawks last night, the Celtics seemed intent on proving their 23-point Wednesday defeat at the strangling hands of the Cavaliers was no fluke.
Needing to re-establish themselves as a group with grit, they proceeded to produce yet another nationally televised rebuke of the hustling manner in which they’d played nearly all season. By the time they got their grind back, most of the country had no doubt tuned out. But now, instead of thinking about another run at the top seed, the Shamrocks have to hope they can hold on to second over these last three games.
“We’ve just got to get our effort level back,” said Jae Crowder after scoring 24 points. “It ain’t about shotmaking. Guys talk about shot-making and this and that. Our effort is something we have total control over, and we ain’t bringing it every night. We’ve got to get back to that.”
The loss was made all the more disturbing by the fact it was paved with more Celtics failure to box out on the boards or get back on defense.
Atlanta had 25 secondchance points and 17 more on fast breaks. One night after the Cavs outrebounded the Celts, 51-38, the Hawks busted them on the boards, 52-38.
Considering how they and their coach had beaten them up over these issues, it bothered the C’s to have those problems back in play.
“Oh, yeah, it always does,” said Isaiah Thomas, who had a game-high 35 points but was part of a starting unit that struggled. “Especially after coming out like that (Wednesday) night. So our first half was really, really frustrating. The second half we got a little bit of life. We know what we’ve got to do, and we’ve just got to do it. It’s on us as players to go out there every night and give it our all and control what we can control and put ourselves in position to win.”
The C’s trailed this one by as many as 20, but they staged a desperate comeback attempt at the end. Led by Marcus Smart (six steals) diving all over the Philips Arena hardwood.
They were able to get as close as five in the final minute, but the Hawks saved the collective psyche of the folks in these parts. If another Atlanta team had blown a lead of 20 or more to a bunch of guys from New England, the state of Georgia may have had to get a group rate for counseling.
The hosts had lost their last two and nine of their previous 11, and rookie Taurean Prince had a career high of 17 coming in, but he surpassed that with 18 — in the first half. Atlanta posted just 82 in a nine-point loss to Brooklyn Sunday. The Hawks had 71 last night — in the first half.
“I mean, we’re supposed to be a defensive team,” said Thomas. “That’s not a defensive team when you give up that many points in a half to a team that doesn’t even score that many points.”
Down by 16 at the half, the Celts were behind, 26-13 on the boards, with nine of the Hawk caroms on the offensive end.
Certainly the Celtics discussed these matters during the break, but the lessons went right over their heads — much like the Hawks offensive rebounds continued to do in the third quarter.
Down by 19 with a little more than two minutes left in the period, Crowder and some Celtics subs showed signs of life. Jaylen Brown and Smart had four points apiece in a 12-3 sprint to the buzzer — a buzzer that Smart barely beat with a step-back trey from the left sideline to get the C’s within 99-89.
The Hawks got tight with the big lead, and the Celtics began to play their game. But the deficit was too big to overcome in the allotted time.
“I thought we really guarded in the second half,” said Brad Stevens. “The first half we weren’t very good, but sometimes you feel like you found something in a loss, and I feel like we can build off this one. (Wednesday) night, no. This one, yeah. I’m more encouraged that I would normally be probably. Again, there’s a lot that we didn’t do well. I don’t want to act like there wasn’t, but we took some things from (last night) that I think we can build off of.”
As Crowder put it, “We just can’t turn our effort level on. That has to be something we hang our hat on. I am shocked that we don’t bring it on a nightly basis, but I’m very encouraged from this loss, because we played the way we want to play. We dictated the game the way we wanted to dictate.
“We just can’t go out and let those guys hit us first. We’ve been doing that for like a week now. We got away with it in a couple of wins here and there, but it’s