Rozier slows down for results
CELTICS NOTEBOOK
PHOENIX — Terry Rozier’s stock has never been higher. Neither has the Celtic guard’s confidence.
Rozier went into last night’s game against Phoenix on a tear, with Sunday night’s 33-point, eight-trey, five-steal, five-rebound performance against Sacramento the biggest night to date of his career.
Rozier only took 16 shots for those 33 points. The key, he says, is he’s seeing the game at a slower speed.
“Just coming off the screens, not in a rush,” he said. “My first two years, being young and not getting that much repetition, and me being young and not watching enough film and getting on myself about how I need to attack and stuff like that. Now that I’m going into my third year I told myself to be more poised and pay attention to details. Just going into the game and slowing my mind down. When everything’s slow and you’re going at your pace, it’s just perfect.
“A lot of older guys tell me slow down, slow down. When you’re going too fast you can’t see everything that’s happening.”
In good spirit
Though Kyrie Irving has started the lonely process of recovering from surgery — a guide wire was removed from his left knee Saturday with the hope of relieving chronic soreness — he tried to stay in touch.
“His spirits are pretty good,” said Celts coach Brad Stevens. “He wants to be here; he wants to play. Nothing new from that standpoint, but his spirits seem good.”
Bird flies in
Rookie guard Jabari Bird has battled back trouble since Jan. 10, the last time he played for the Maine Red Claws. But at a time when Stevens is routinely giving meaningful minutes to young players, Bird is now getting spot minutes, including an eight-minute stint against the Kingsto cool down Buddy Hield.
“He wasn’t cleared until this week,” Stevens said of Bird’s activation. “He may have been ready, but I wasn’t told he was ready. When he started traveling with us is when he was officially cleared. Even go back to the third game of the season when he was guarding (Philadelphia’s J.J.) Redick on a few positions. Hield had it going, we were losing him on some cuts, and I wanted to give him a different look, and Jabari is over there hungry to play, and he was going to bust it on every possession to be there.”
No fluke at all
Stevens looks at Loyola Chicago’s run to the Final Four a lot like what his Butler teams accomplished — a small-conference school that, based on its talent, is not a fluke.
“Awesome. The one thing as a guy that’s coached a team from a lower league that people should not dismiss is, they’re really good, really good,” Stevens said. “They could easily cut down the nets next Monday night. People can talk about size of school and all that other stuff. They have guys that really believe, and an excellent head coach. He was in our league my last year in the Horizon League when Porter (Moser) joined Loyola. They were shorthanded at the time he took over, but you could tell he was a special coach. It’s fun to see how that thing’s really grown.”
If Stevens could offer Moser one piece of advice, it would have almost nothing to do with basketball.
“Tell your players to get out of the ticket business today,” said Stevens. “You have more friends this week than you’ve ever had before . . . . Give your tickets away today, and tomorrow start working on the Michigan scout.”