Are things different for the Celtics this year?
How they respond to the Heat in Game 2 will be quite telling
As you might have noticed (because how could you not?), every NBA playoff team has a slogan that is emphasized and branded on every giveaway and tchotchke imaginable.
For the Celtics, the phrase that pays is, “It’s different here.”
Not bad, as far as those contrived slogans go, though “Hey, how ‘bout we collect that 18th banner and finally have another parade in this city?” is more on point.
But what matters as the juggernaut, 64-win, top-seeded Celtics accelerate into their first-round playoff series with the dastardly Heat is whether it’s different here.
What matters is that it’s different from last year.
I believe it is. I do, and you should too.
The Celtics, with their richly talented and complementary starting five, much-improved bench, and offensive flexibility unlocked by Kristaps Porzingis, are a superior team to the one that fell behind, 3-0, and lost to the Heat in seven games in the Eastern Conference finals last year.
But it must be acknowledged that the Celtics’ Game 1 victory Sunday, as impressive and dominant as they were for most of it, left some old familiar concerns lingering.
The Celtics started as if they’d been waiting for this stage for weeks, jumping to a 17-2 lead. The Heat delivered bursts of counterpunches, but after a 31-14 third quarter launched the Celtics to a 91-59 lead, it looked like it was over.
And it was. But not without a lot of unnecessary tension.
The Celtics slipped into casual mode on offense, the Heat never stopped chipping away, and … well, even as time and score suggested the math was never on Miami’s side, it got more uncomfortable than
it needed to be, especially once Heat backup Delon Wright decided to hit a three seemingly every other trip down the court.
“I think we have to take that moment when they started to make that comeback and use that as that driving force for us going forward,” said Porzingis, who is almost casually truthful about the Celtics’ bad habits.
“They can make shots. They can throw some punches back too. They’re dangerous too. We cannot just take it for granted and be like, ‘OK, we’re going to be able to walk past them.’ Maintaining that healthy edge for us going forward is going to be very important.”
The Celtics won by 20. That counts as a blowout. But at times, they sure do have a way of making a big lead feel small.
It seems strange to say, but this is the truth: The biggest shot of the day wasn’t by Porzingis, Jayson Tatum, or Jaylen Brown when they established their early lead, or by Sam Hauser, who channeled 1985 Scott Wedman in the second quarter, burying four threes without a miss.
It was Derrick White’s three with 3:35 remaining to give the Celtics an 106-88 advantage. It interrupted an 18-2 Heat run and confirmed that the Celtics indeed had plans to make another shot before the final buzzer.
Admit it: You were starting to wonder.
(White, by the way, played a fabulous second half, scoring 18 of his 20 and making smart decision after smart decision. I continue to believe the Celtics would be best served if every important possession were initiated by White.)
The fourth quarter also had better stick as a reminder of the cruel twists that can happen when business isn’t taken care of. The Celtics endured this last year when Tatum rolled his ankle on the first play of Game 7, ruining their long climb back from their mostly self-inflicted three-game hole in that series.
For a frightening moment late in the fourth quarter, the Celtics’ willingness to let the Heat believe they were mounting the comeback of all comebacks nearly got Tatum hurt again. With 59.1 seconds left and the Celtics leading, 110-94, Tatum was undercut by the Heat’s reckless Caleb Martin. Tatum landed on his tailbone and popped right up, but the fall was enough to make the Garden crowd gasp in unison.
The Celtics had a 32-point lead going into the fourth quarter. But because they played around and made it tense, if not exactly close, the starters were in long after they should have been.
They have to learn this lesson. They cannot give the Heat — the battered, proud, physical, borderline dirty, Jimmy Butler-less, defending Eastern Conference champion Heat — any opportunity to do something weaselly that affects the Celtics beyond this series.
Just look around the league. Giannis Antetokounmpo and Joel Embiid are hurt. The Heat are missing their soul in Butler, as well as fearless Terry Rozier. One of the small miracles of this Celtics season is that they remained healthy heading into the playoffs. It’s one of their biggest advantages. They can’t put that at risk by frittering away opportunities to put a game away and get off the court.
The Celtics are the far superior team. They need to remind the Heat of that, relentlessly and ruthlessly. They cannot give the Heat oxygen, fleeting hope, or a flicker of a chance to steal a game in Boston. This should be a first-round sweep, one with even less suspense than their four-game wipeout of the Nets two years ago.
But the Celtics also must know that they can’t take anything for granted against the Heat. Everything — everything — is going to have to be earned.
It’s different here. Yeah, it is. And it’s different this year. The Celtics crushed the Heat for most of Game 1. The next step to proving that they’ve changed, that lessons have been learned, is to do it again in Game 2. But with less mercy.