Celtics can’t cash in chances to catch up
CLEVELAND, OH » Opportunity washed over the Celtics in waves Monday night. Still they came up dry. All evening long, Cleveland opened the door and invited them in, but the Bostonians hemmed and hawed and stumbled on the top step. So the Cavaliers slammed Game 4 in their kisser.
There is no denying the LeBrons were the better team here, but the Celts are at a severe risk of an ACL tear as they kick themselves for what might have, could have, though probably shouldn’t have been.
“You definitely kick yourself,” Marcus Smart said after the C’s had to heat up to shoot 41.2 percent for the game. “I mean, those are shots we hit on a daily (basis), and they just didn’t fall for us. You know, we’re confident they’ll fall for us Wednesday (in Game 5 at the Garden). We’ve got to keep shooting them.”
On a night when they executed the basketball version of the butt fumble by slamming dunks off the iron and failed to find the strings even on some open layups, the Celtics left town with a 111-102 loss that made this Eastern Conference finals a 2-2 dogfight.
The Cavs shot 61.5 percent in the first half and led the game by as many as 19, but they turned
the ball over 19 times and always seemed vulnerable to a Celtics run.
If only the visitors could have sustained one.
“When we had it to eight, I thought we missed a couple of really good opportunities on offense that were really good shots,” coach Brad Stevens said. “Then I thought we did try to hit home runs on some other shots as we were coming back. Those will catch up with you.”
There were some strange whistles throughout the game, and certainly the Celtics were on the short side of their share. But this was on them. After stretches in which they play well, they ceased to play smart.
“I felt the same way,” said Marcus Morris, who was part of a potentially large play when he hit a trey to get the Celts within 10 two minutes into the third quarter only to have the hoop disallowed when he was called for an offensive foul, allegedly extending his right leg to make contact.
“You know, we had a few chances, but at the end of the day, we’re all human. We missed shots. Things happen. We can’t dwell on this. We play a game Wednesday. We’ll try to take that one. Some shots go down, some don’t. You know, some fouls happen. We can’t dwell on it, man. We’ve got to continue to go forward and take care of home court.”
It would have been tough for the Celtics to get out of here with a win under any circumstances, but they never really pushed the Cavs to a point where the collars on their jerseys got uncomfortably tight.
Aron Baynes hit one of two free throws with 6:55 left to get the C’s within 96-89, but Cleveland was able to retrieve three missed shots on the next possession before Kevin Love tipped one in.
Jaylen Brown responded just a few seconds later with a 3-point pull-up brick, and LeBron James went the other way for an easy layup, an 11-point margin and a collective Cleveland exhale.
A couple of minutes later, Smart drove to make it a seven-point game again, but the Celts got lost on defense and Tristan Thompson got an open dunk. After a Jayson Tatum miss, Morris tried to save the ball from going out of bounds at the other end.