Full disclosure: I attended the Dec 27 home game against Cleveland.
That was a super fun game. The Celts dominated pretty much from the latter part of the 1st quarter through to the end. Tatum and Brown each scored 30 points. The Celts came away from that game with a 22-7 record. There were a lot of things to feel good about from that one game and for the season as a whole to that point.
What's happened since then? The Celts have played 11 games and gone 5-6.
They've lost those 6 games by an average margin of -10.83 points.
Am I responsible? Did I make this happen? Surely not. But can it be ruled out?
Anyway, I find myself wondering what's going on. Is there a consistent trend across this slump?
One is first quarters:
36 to 25 against Toronto
26 to 17 against Washington
34 to 22 against San Antonio
36 to 20 against Milwaukee
Another is awful shooting / the other team getting really hot:
52.4% to 39.7% FG vs TOR
46.4% to 34.7% FG vs WAS
55.2% to 41.6% FG vs SAS
60.3% to 49.4% FG vs DET
51.6% to 30.6% 3P FG% vs MIL
That second one could have something to do with the fact that the games against Toronto, Philly, and Milwaukee were all the second night of a back to back.
Overall that's a major factor here: the Celts have played 11 games, 5 of them on the road, in a span of exactly 3 weeks. They've basically played a game every other day.
This stretch feels worse because of how bad the losses have been, coupled with the fact that they've lost to three rivals in the conference (TOR, PHI, MIL), and their wins have come against a set of opponents (CHA, ATL, CHI, NOP) who have an average of 13.75 wins on the season.
So:
- Poor shooting
- Getting blitzed in 1st quarters
- Losing big to, for the most part, quality opponents
- Lots of games in a short time
- Time frame is end of the holidays through mid-January
The simple explanation here is that they're hitting a rough stretch of the schedule at the worst time. They're tired and they've had guys in and out of the lineup with nagging injuries.
I'm not sure there's more to it than that. I hope there's not more to it than that.
What am I missing?