Celtics (43-28) at 76ers (46-25) Game #72 3/20/19

[Boston Garden Leprechaun]

I know Kyrie scored a lot of points tonight, but he wasn't very efficient, and the ball doesn't seem like it moved very well if we only had 22 assists on 46 made buckets.  We made 11 more baskets than Philly, and Philly had more assists than us.

I don't think having Kyrie shoot 30 times a game and Brown and Smart combining for 7 shots  is likely to be good for our team as a whole.  That said, Embiid shooting 21 fts is probably what killed us tonight.  Too much fouling, not enough good def in the post?

Full disclosure, I didn't watch tonight's game, these observations are just from the stats.

Pretty much sums it up. Kyrie was good statistically, but not efficient in the final minutes of the 4th quarter

that is a fair statement

it sure beats the narrative by some here who say we are better without kyrie and the keep terry instead crowd LOL

now was kyrie the only one who may have hampered us at the end?

NO

we lost tonight due to many reasons.

As long as he's a Celtic, I'll always be an admirer of Kyrie and his game. But tonight was not his highlight reel for certain.

LOL GOOD LUCK CONVEYING THAT TO NOBODYS IN THIS THREAD

hahahahahahahahahah

they won't be happy until we walks

pure subjective narratives they push

pathetic

[Somebody]

Kyrie taking responsibility for the loss because of missed shots at the end

I know it's not entirely his fault (no one expects him to be able to guard Butler) but he should take responsibility for letting Butler absolutely **** on him in the final five minutes of the game as well.

HAPPY NOW? LOL

or will you be better if he walks?

this loss was due to many factors

stop melting kid

Kid if you bothered to read my posts, I literally stated that we should find ways to build around him while maximizing the talent around him. You're the one who's melting lol

[Somebody]

Kyrie taking responsibility for the loss because of missed shots at the end

I know it's not entirely his fault (no one expects him to be able to guard Butler) but he should take responsibility for letting Butler absolutely **** on him in the final five minutes of the game as well.

Oh he took responsibility for that too. I posted my comment while the interview was still happening. He shielded his teammates from a lot of blame.

Good stuff, he played well tonight imo, just had some errors here and there. More of a coaching issue to me.

[tenn_smoothie]

Only good thing about the Celts game ending is getting Doris Burke off the air.

[slamtheking]

really disappointing game. 
- Edited.  Profanity and masked profanity are against forum rules and may result in discipline. with Baynes.  the guy is more fragile than glass.  also as a general rule, done with him shooting 3's too.
- Smart - Edited.  Profanity and masked profanity are against forum rules and may result in discipline..  need to keep your head.  guy is too easy to rattle and it cost us on defense.
- Kyrie - numbers look nice but he was not the clutch player we need down the stretch.  poorly run offense the second half of the last quarter.  no reason for Kyrie to be taking 29 shots with 4 assists.  some really poor shot selection too.
- got beat on the glass at critical times in the game.
- Edited.  Profanity and masked profanity are against forum rules and may result in discipline. with the FTs.  C's went to the rim a number of times and drew contact.  no excuse for that kind of disparity. 
- Morris was awful
- Brown should have gotten a lot more than 3 shots.
- Rozier - quite possibly his best game all year.  this is the level of play I expected this season.  if he plays like this through the rest of the season and playoffs, I'll take it.
- Semi was decent in his minutes. 
- 12-32 on 3's so another cold night with Kyrie going an extremely frosty 3-13. 

[PhoSita]

why are you guys complaining Cs were down 3 players.

Because they still could've won, and still SHOULD'VE won. Awful defense down the stretch, Irving missed two bunnies, and Butler suddenly got hot.

Yeah, here's the thing for all the excuses -- they were up 14 at multiple times in this game.

We've seen this all season.

A serious contending team doesn't lose this many games against quality opponents after holding double digit leads.

A serious contending team doesn't get down by double digits nearly so often as this team, either.


I'm not accepting any excuses -- but I'm also done feeling any kind of urgency or alarm.  The Celtics are what they are.  And that's a team that is less than the sum of their parts; a good not great playoff team; and overall -- a disappointment that I will not miss.

[gouki88]

Kyrie taking responsibility for the loss because of missed shots at the end

I know it's not entirely his fault (no one expects him to be able to guard Butler) but he should take responsibility for letting Butler absolutely **** on him in the final five minutes of the game as well.

Oh he took responsibility for that too. I posted my comment while the interview was still happening. He shielded his teammates from a lot of blame.

Good stuff, he played well tonight imo, just had some errors here and there. More of a coaching issue to me.

Playing a certain Marcus Morris brutalised us down the stretch. Looking at you, Brad

[ozgod]

Honestly I know many people are wrist slitting about this loss but I'm not as upset about it. We lost Baynes, Smart, were without Hayward, got juked on free throw attempts to the tune of 43-16 where they got 39 points at the line and it took a couple of defensive miscommunications at the end and a last second Butler circus 3 to beat us. I can live with them missing shots at the end. The only thing I think they need to fix is the defensive lapses at the end, the Sixers got 6 points uncontested at the rim in the last 3 minutes because of those switching miscommunications. Those have plagued our team all season and put a blemish on what is otherwise a good team defense for us.

And that free throw disparity, Ainge should be sending the league a "please explain" on that.

I'm probably more worried about how static the offense looked in the latter half of the fourth quarter-it was all the PG running pick and rolls with Horford and never passing the ball to Jaylen posting up on Redick/open Tatum. Also how Kyrie got abused by Butler but that's more of a substitution issue.

The defensive lapses worry me because they're totally avoidable for the most part, it's someone switching when they're not supposed to and vice versa and not communicating when they do so. I would love our offense to be humming on all cylinders too, but I feel that even if we aren't playing well offensively if we are playing well defensively we'll always be in with a shot.

Agree that they should have abused Redick more. I was calling for that in the game thread.

[Somebody]

Kyrie taking responsibility for the loss because of missed shots at the end

I know it's not entirely his fault (no one expects him to be able to guard Butler) but he should take responsibility for letting Butler absolutely **** on him in the final five minutes of the game as well.

Oh he took responsibility for that too. I posted my comment while the interview was still happening. He shielded his teammates from a lot of blame.

Good stuff, he played well tonight imo, just had some errors here and there. More of a coaching issue to me.

Playing a certain Marcus Morris brutalised us down the stretch. Looking at you, Brad

Ikr, sucks that a certain leprechaun couldn't comprehend that I'm pointing fingers at Brad rather than Kyrie-his sieve defense is something we'll have to work with.

[ozgod]

why are you guys complaining Cs were down 3 players.

Because they still could've won, and still SHOULD'VE won. Awful defense down the stretch, Irving missed two bunnies, and Butler suddenly got hot.

Yeah, here's the thing for all the excuses -- they were up 14 at multiple times in this game.

We've seen this all season.

A serious contending team doesn't lose this many games against quality opponents after holding double digit leads.

A serious contending team doesn't get down by double digits nearly so often as this team, either.


I'm not accepting any excuses -- but I'm also done feeling any kind of urgency or alarm.  The Celtics are what they are.  And that's a team that is less than the sum of their parts; a good not great playoff team; and overall -- a disappointment that I will not miss.

Does anyone know if there's a statistical way to find this out, other than manually going through box scores? I'm very curious to see where the Celtics rank against other potential top 4 seeds in both East and West when it comes to losing games after holding double digit leads and losing games after conceding double digit leads.

[Somebody]

Honestly I know many people are wrist slitting about this loss but I'm not as upset about it. We lost Baynes, Smart, were without Hayward, got juked on free throw attempts to the tune of 43-16 where they got 39 points at the line and it took a couple of defensive miscommunications at the end and a last second Butler circus 3 to beat us. I can live with them missing shots at the end. The only thing I think they need to fix is the defensive lapses at the end, the Sixers got 6 points uncontested at the rim in the last 3 minutes because of those switching miscommunications. Those have plagued our team all season and put a blemish on what is otherwise a good team defense for us.

And that free throw disparity, Ainge should be sending the league a "please explain" on that.

I'm probably more worried about how static the offense looked in the latter half of the fourth quarter-it was all the PG running pick and rolls with Horford and never passing the ball to Jaylen posting up on Redick/open Tatum. Also how Kyrie got abused by Butler but that's more of a substitution issue.

The defensive lapses worry me because they're totally avoidable for the most part, it's someone switching when they're not supposed to and vice versa and not communicating when they do so. I would love our offense to be humming on all cylinders too, but I feel that even if we aren't playing well offensively if we are playing well defensively we'll always be in with a shot.

Agree that they should have abused Redick more. I was calling for that in the game thread.

I think the defense will tighten up in the playoffs, as you said it's fixable. I'm more worried about the offense because it's more of an accumulation of habits-it's more difficult to flip the switch on and off when it comes to passing the ball and moving.

[blink]

I know Kyrie scored a lot of points tonight, but he wasn't very efficient, and the ball doesn't seem like it moved very well if we only had 22 assists on 46 made buckets.  We made 11 more baskets than Philly, and Philly had more assists than us.

I don't think having Kyrie shoot 30 times a game and Brown and Smart combining for 7 shots  is likely to be good for our team as a whole.  That said, Embiid shooting 21 fts is probably what killed us tonight.  Too much fouling, not enough good def in the post?

Full disclosure, I didn't watch tonight's game, these observations are just from the stats.

Pretty much sums it up. Kyrie was good statistically, but not efficient in the final minutes of the 4th quarter

And was a sieve on defense that led the Sixers back into the game. Brad should've subbed in a defensive lineup to grind out the game.

Yes, Kyrie defense was bad tonight as well. Especially on those last 2 buckets by Butler.

He gave up at least ten points to Butler in the final five minutes of the game.

The other Q with that is why was Kyrie even guarding butler?

[tenn_smoothie]

I get a kick out of when your narrative isn't totally supported, "The haters are out." It's so 2019ish.

you mean your narrative? that we are better without kyrie or he sux? and we should keep terry instead?  LOL

Consider this - Instead of Kyrie - a brilliant offensive player and not much else - we add a starting playmaker deluxe point guard and a knock-down shooter off the bench - both guys team players and solid defenders. You telling me that would not be a better fit with the other players and their style, not to mention the Coach's system being better served ?

Who are these players and how are we getting them?

^this. We're stuck with Kyrie for better or worse, and we need to find a way to maximize the talent around him while retaining his individual excellence. That lies on the coaching imo, and so far it's been meh.

This idea of " find a way to get Irving and the youngsters to play better together is getting real old and is not going to happen - it's like beating your head against a wall. Kyrie is a square peg on this particular team, never mind his destructive moodiness, which will crop up again soon enough.

Man, for as much crap as you give me for being very pro-Kyrie, you really work your hardest to make everything his fault

Not really that hard, Gouk

Having said that, I do hate that there is such a division among Celtic fans about one player - I don't ever remember something like this - maybe Antoine Walker.

[Tr1boy]

really disappointing game. 
- **** with Baynes.  the guy is more fragile than glass.  also as a general rule, done with him shooting 3's too.
- Smart - ****.  need to keep your head.  guy is too easy to rattle and it cost us on defense.
- Kyrie - numbers look nice but he was not the clutch player we need down the stretch.  poorly run offense the second half of the last quarter.  no reason for Kyrie to be taking 29 shots with 4 assists.  some really poor shot selection too.
- got beat on the glass at critical times in the game.
- **** with the FTs.  C's went to the rim a number of times and drew contact.  no excuse for that kind of disparity. 
- Morris was awful
- Brown should have gotten a lot more than 3 shots.
- Rozier - quite possibly his best game all year.  this is the level of play I expected this season.  if he plays like this through the rest of the season and playoffs, I'll take it.
- Semi was decent in his minutes. 
- 12-32 on 3's so another cold night with Kyrie going an extremely frosty 3-13.

29 shots vs 4 assists .  3-13

*facepalm*

Maybe Irving comes from the Carmelo Anthony school of basketball =T

[gpap]

really disappointing game. 
- **** with Baynes.  the guy is more fragile than glass.  also as a general rule, done with him shooting 3's too.
- Smart - ****.  need to keep your head.  guy is too easy to rattle and it cost us on defense.
- Kyrie - numbers look nice but he was not the clutch player we need down the stretch.  poorly run offense the second half of the last quarter.  no reason for Kyrie to be taking 29 shots with 4 assists.  some really poor shot selection too.
- got beat on the glass at critical times in the game.
- **** with the FTs.  C's went to the rim a number of times and drew contact.  no excuse for that kind of disparity. 
- Morris was awful
- Brown should have gotten a lot more than 3 shots.
- Rozier - quite possibly his best game all year.  this is the level of play I expected this season.  if he plays like this through the rest of the season and playoffs, I'll take it.
- Semi was decent in his minutes. 
- 12-32 on 3's so another cold night with Kyrie going an extremely frosty 3-13.

Yeah, I'll never understand why Baynes takes those 3-pointers. He looks so dumb attempting them.

Also, memo to Danny Ainge: This is why our team needs a center!!! To combat guys like Embiid. Not rocket science.