Logo
The Ticker
6 hours ago

5 Questions With Josh McRoberts

I talked to Los Angeles back up big man Josh McRoberts prior to the Celtics-Lakers game Thursday night at the Garden.  Here is what the former Duke Blue Devil, who is averaging 2.9 points and 3.8 rebounds in his first year in LA, had to say. 1. How have you guys been able to deal [...]

1
8 hours ago

5-on-5: Predicting All-Star Reserves

I was a panelist on the 5-on-5 today at ESPN, choosing reserves for the Eastern and Western Conference all-star teams. I took two Celtics, as noted below. Hit the link to read the rest. 1. Which East and West point guards should be chosen as All-Star reserves? Ryan DeGama, CelticsHub: East: Deron Williams, Rajon Rondo [...]

0
2 days ago

Greg Stiemsma’s Contract To Become Fully Guaranteed

The C’s gave their 26-year-old rookie a vote of confidence before Tuesday’s game. By not waiving the seven-footer, Stiemsma’s contract will become fully guaranteed on Friday, allowing the shot blocker to breath a little bit and perhaps unpack some boxes for good in Beantown. Here’s Chris Forsberg of ESPN Boston with some reaction from Stiemsma and [...]

1
2 days ago

5 Questions With Kemba Walker

I had a chance to talk with Bobcats rookie Kemba Walker prior to the Celtics game against Charlotte on Tuesday night.  Here is what the UConn star, who is averaging 12.3 points, 4 rebounds, and 3.6 assists per game had to say. 1. How much communication have you had with Michael Jordan this year? Walker: [...]

1
3 days ago

I Am Awesome!

Yes. This is a “pat myself on the back” post because a) I’m a jackass and b) I predicted something correctly. Back on January 8th, I predicted that the next ten games will tell us everything we need to know about this Celtics’ team. If they struggled, it was time to blow it up. If [...]

1
3 days ago

Pierce Wins Eastern Conference Player Of Week

One day before he’s scheduled to pass Larry Bird for second on the Celtics’ all-time scoring list, Paul Pierce won the Eastern Conference Player of the Week award. Pierce averaged 22 points, 6.3 assists and 5.8 rebounds in four Boston wins, playing point forward in Rajon Rondo’s absence. Pierce is only 9 points behind Bird [...]

1
Browse Archives by:

Sound off: Am I worried the C’s are 1-4 against Los Angeles, San Antonio and Cleveland?

Editor’s Note: This is the second of a three-part “three-man weave” on CelticsHub.com. Check back tomorrow afternoon for another fresh perspective.

(AP Photo/Michael Dwyer)

(AP Photo/Michael Dwyer)

Call me overconfident but I am not overly worried about the Celtics lack of success playing elite teams this year. When you look at the Celtics 1-4 record against these teams, I think the quotes Jeff Clark of Celticsblog pulled from Paul Pierce and Doc Rivers at the end of the Spurs game explain my lack of anxiety:

Pierce: “When you play the top teams in the league, it comes down to the little things. One play can kill you. Every possession counts, and we’ve got to understand that when we play against the top-tier teams like the Spurs and the Lakers.”

Rivers echoed Pierce’s comments about executing the little things and went further.

“Well it tells me that we’re really good, because we’ve not played with our A-game and we still had a chance to win both.”

That last quote by Rivers sums it up for me perfectly right there. In each of these five games the Celtics have not played a complete game. Even in the season opener against Cleveland they won, they were not impressive and benefited from Lebron James choking on some free throws down the stretch.

Despite the C’s not playing well they nearly went 3-2 in these games. A couple breaks go our way such as KG fouling out on a phantom call against LA, and the bizarre Ray Allen turnover at the end of the San Antonio game and we would likely not even be having this discussion.

The encouraging thing is that despite not playing a complete game the Celtics could have stolen both of these games. However they didn’t and we shouldn’t have expected them too. The ball didn’t fall our way either of these nights. It happens.

What would have alarmed me in these games is if the Celtics were playing up to their potential, especially at home and still lost these games. That would show that the talent gap would be in the other contenders favor, and that is a department that the Celtics will likely not be able to address over the rest of this season. I think most Celtics fans would agree though that this has not been the case.

My mindset right now is in a wait and see approach regarding this team. The Celtics still have a total of three matchups with Cleveland and San Antonio on the calendar. If the Celtics fail to play well and do not win any of these games, then yes it is time to hit the panic button.

The Celtics proved they could match up with these teams in crunch time during last year’s playoffs. I do not think they have lost that this year. They have just not shown it yet.

Is this Celtics team more flawed than last year? Absolutely. Will these flaws keep the Celtics from beating said teams in a seven game series? That remains to be seen. For now however I still remain confident in the defending champs.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>