Slow starts nothing new for the Boston Celtics under coach Brad Stevens

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Slow starts nothing new for the Boston Celtics under coach Brad Stevens




By Scott Souza
ssouza@wickedlocal.com


Posted Nov 13, 2018 at 7:13 PM
Updated Nov 13, 2018 at 7:13 PM



It has more often than not taken Stevens awhile to find the right rotations, and push the right buttons, to get his squad rolling toward the postseason.


BOSTON – Brad Stevens often talks about last year’s 16-game win streak following Gordon Hayward’s opening night injury as an outlier.

The Celtics coach notes that – if you take away the streak – the team wasn’t nearly as good in the regular season – 39-27 – as its fight for the top seed in the Eastern Conference suggested. Yet, that streak is also another outlier in the Stevens Era overall.

It is really the only time the Celtics have been all that good in the first two months of a season since his arrival.

During the team’s first run to the Eastern Conference finals in 2016-17, the Celtics were 13-12 on Dec. 14. In the first full season with Isaiah Thomas the year prior, Boston was 14-13 on Dec. 18, and 19-19 on Jan. 12. In the rebuilding season the year before that, the Celtics were 7-14 on Dec. 12, and 16-30 on Feb. 1, before an improbable run into the playoffs.

It has more often than not taken Stevens awhile to find the right rotations, and push the right buttons, to get his squad rolling toward the postseason. It’s just that this season – with all the returning talent and hype surrounding a supposed championship contender – the relative struggles of a 7-6 squad coming off a 1-4 road trip seem far more perplexing.

“We’ve been saying the same thing since preseason,” Jaylen Brown said prior to Tuesday’s “back-to-basics” practice at Auerbach Center. “You could say the road trip was a wake-up call because we played five games and lost four. So we definitely have to heed that because we’re better than that. Even at our worst, we should be better than that.”

Stevens was not deflecting any of the blame for the lackluster start on Tuesday. As he stressed the need for ownership from his players, he repeatedly pointed the finger right back at himself first and foremost.

“As a coach your job is to make sure that everybody is accountable for their role,” he said. “I would say that I need to be better. We all play a role in it. But that’s my job.

“Our accountability across the board has to be better. That starts with me. I have to do a better job. We have a lot of guys who aren’t playing up to their level. So I’ve got to do better.”


The coach said he had spent the last two days following a 100-94 loss to the Portland Trailblazers trying to figure out what changes might be necessary.

“Obviously, the easy question, and easy thought, is who starts,” Stevens said. “I think it’s just as much rotations in the game that we need to be better with and maybe find some groups that play better together. I think in the Portland game we saw some of that in the second half.

“When we play really urgent and desperate, we’re pretty good. We’re just not there enough. So it’s hard to really to pin that on a lineup, or a person.”

One change that already appears to be happening is lifting the minute restriction for Hayward. Hayward was on the floor for 31 minutes on the second night of a back-to-back Sunday – a substantial increase over the 25-per-night he had been averaging through the first 12 games.

“For sure, it helps,” Hayward said. “Not only for me finding a rhythm, being able to feel the game out, just timing and rhythm. I also think it helps some of the other guys too. My minutes were kind of in weird bursts. That’s hard to play with too. Maybe it will help everybody.”

While the slow starts are nothing new to Stevens – and the goal remains to be having the team play its best basketball in April over a Wednesday night November home game against the Chicago Bulls – the coach knows that with higher expectations this season comes more pressure on his players with each loss or disjointed effort.

He also knows part of being a coach is to put his players in the best position he can for them to be successful and that includes having them not have to explain each day how a team that was widely forecast to be racing down the express lane back to at least the conference finals appears stuck in neutral for so long.


“When we’re desperate and urgent, we’re damn good,” Stevens said. “When we’re not – whew – we’re bad. So we need to do a better job to make sure we play the right way all the way through.

“What I’ve spent the last 48 hours on is that that’s the coach’s responsibility.”



bob



.

one question:

Is Brad Stevens old enough to curse?

During this 5 year rebuild, Danny flipped the roster over twice. In between that there was quite a bit of players coming and going.

I am a firm believer that once you have the right mix of players you have a chance to begin a period of roster stability. I think the Celtics entered that period last year but unforeseen injuries combined with a lack of familiarity kept the team from reaching their ultimate goal.

I like our roster and I believe they will continue to improve the more that they play together.