Glass work not pretty
Matter of effort in tough loss
‘We’ve just got to pay attention to detail more and fight for the ball.’
The Celtics can be criticized for a number of things in their 111103 loss to Washington yesterday, among them the failure to use festive wrapping paper and a bow.
Indeed, this one was a Christmas gift.
The Wizards were talking about their hustle and resolve, and they weren’t incorrect. But when you take into account the way their effort manifested itself on the floor and stat sheet, the Celts had the lead role in the holiday play.
In the fourth quarter when they were turning a five-point lead into whine, they gave up seven offensive rebounds and 10 second-chance points.
Read that again: 10 secondchance points. In the fourth quarter alone. For the game, the counts were 14 offensive boards and 18 extra-chance points.
No need to call out the Analytics CSI Squad. The Celtics have met the enemy, and it is them.
Credit the Wiz as much as you wish for keeping their heads and hearts in the game when the Celtics came back, took the aforementioned lead midway through the fourth quarter and appeared ready to throw their visitors out before dessert.
But when defenders do their jobs and generally place themselves between their opponents and the bucket when shots go up, it is expected that, with reasonable care and effort, they have the advantage for rebounds.
“I mean, those are killer possessions when you have a stop and you just can’t finish that stop,” C’s coach Brad Stevens said. “We turned and looked instead of blocked out most of the night, and it ended up costing us.
“Again, I think it’s not only, as you know, it’s not just 10 points. It’s the idea that you had a stop and then you gave up a basket. You know, like, you’ve got to finish plays at a better level.
“That’s been a pretty consistent theme with us over the last couple weeks,” Stevens added. “We’re not rebounding from the wing the way we did earlier in the year, and against these guys, you don’t have that margin for error. They’re just too good, and I thought they had their way with us in a lot of ways.”
As for the breakdown being a positional matter or simply a lack of “want to,” Stevens said, “I’m sure that each rebound has its own story. But as you go back and look at it, I felt like we were in position to block out quite a bit. We just turned and followed the ball instead of went to the body.”
The issue certainly hits home for Terry Rozier, one of the better rebounding guards in the league who had seven caroms in 26 minutes yesterday.
“I mean, it’s very tough,” he said. “We’re working so hard on defense, and it happened a lot tonight where they got to the board before us. But that’s all effort and being tough.
“We were the best rebounding
— GUARD TERRY ROZIER On Celts’ rebounding troubles
team in the league at the beginning of the season, so like coach said, that’s a choice. We’ve got to make that choice to rebound . . . . We’ve just got to pay attention to detail more and fight for the ball.”
Even in their win against the Bulls on Saturday, the Celts gave up 12 second-chance points. And the Knicks hit them for 18 two nights earlier in New York.
It’s an unsightly turnabout from earlier in the season when they were the ones showing up their foes with relentless hustle.
“For us, it’s just demoralizing when you go through something like that where you play good defense and then it’s a long shot or a long rebound and you just don’t come up with it,” Kyrie Irving said. “So for us, we have to take our effort to another level. That’s on us, and it’s something that we can control.”
That they are not doing so is a tad troubling.
“It’s tough because mentally we’ve been making those plays,” Al Horford said. “We knew that they crash the offensive glass pretty hard, but their guards did a great job of just flying in there and getting those 50-50 balls and tipping and keeping balls alive. And that was hard because I felt like our set defense was really good, and then we just had a breakdown at the end, things that we can control that got away.” So we’re talking effort, right? “Effort,” Horford said, “but I think focus more than anything. I think it’s really focus. I think that too many times, I felt like guys who were really, really focused are now . . . here and there we have too many ‘my bads.’
“And that’s a thing that we need to address, and we need to be better. I felt like the Chicago game we took a step toward being better, and we regressed tonight. But we need to start being more consistent, no question about that.”
The C’s still are a lofty 27-10, and the fact that what’s ailing them is within their power to cure makes this no great cause for concern, yet. But cracks in the mental armor never should be taken lightly.