BOSTON — The Celtics are stuck in what’s been a mini rut dragging the team to consecutive defeats for the first time this season and losers in five of their last 10 games played.
Jayson Tatum assured it wasn’t a cause for concern after Boston collapsed to the Philadelphia 76ers on Christmas Day, and head coach Joe Mazzulla couldn’t agree more. Mazzulla, in fact, welcomes the challenge that comes with an Eastern Conference finals rematch with the Indiana Pacers on Friday night.
“It’s an 82-game regular season. It’s never the wrong time for anything,” Mazzulla said pregame at TD Garden. “Like, whatever it is, it is. It’s the opportunity that the schedule presents for you and you handle it, you deal with it, you execute it and you move on. There’s never a wrong time for anything.”
Mazzulla continued: “It’s great. I’m excited for that, I can’t wait. I think it’ll be a good time. Either we accept the challenge or we don’t and we learn from it and we move on.”
That was the mindset last season, which of course, produced a championship.
Boston, earlier in the week, surrendered a 15-point lead in the second half to the up-and-coming Orlando Magic — without stars Paolo Banchero and Franz Wagner. The Celtics didn’t have their in-despair 3-point shooting and showed little signs of urgency in the decisive moments, failing to readjust routinely.
The Celtics rank 16th in the league, shooting 36.5% from three, which is a significant fall from their second-place ranking back in October — Boston shot 40.7% across its first six games. And to amplify the challenge of avoiding three straight losses, the Celtics share the floor with the Pacers without starters Jrue Holiday and Kristaps Porzingis, forcing Mazzulla to bump Al Horford and Sam Hauser into the starting five.
“They’re doing pretty good,” Mazzulla revealed.
Mazzulla wanted to clarify that he’s, in no way, questioning the team’s motivation and considers those reigning champion stereotypes a blinded misunderstanding.
“I would never say that we’re not motivated. I would never say that,” Mazzulla said. “I don’t think that’s the case in a lot of things. I think it’s more of the details at times, the communication at times. I don’t question the intrinsic motivation to our guys or where they’re at. I don’t think that’s the case at all and I think it’s easy to look at one game and say it’s the defense. … I just think when you’re in a tough stretch or it’s not going well, the easiest thing for the untrained eye to see is defense, effort, motivation and those are just kind of words that people throw around.”
Boston fell to Indiana during their first meeting this season back on Oct. 30.
