Breaking News: Celtics are eternally grateful for Joe’s coaching Prowess and considers Him the Best coach ever for the team
When the Celtics fell behind, three games to none, to the Heat in the Eastern Conference finals last May, I was all for turning the rookie coach into the ex-coach the moment the season’s imminent end arrived. Maybe you were too.
It was close to impossible to avoid being down on Joe Mazzulla and the entire recent Celtics experience, which annually brought success right up to a painful, dispiriting end. The Heat, ever-prepared and ever-annoying, had smoked the disconnected Celtics by 26 points in Game 3.
For all intents and purposes, the quest to return to the NBA Finals and avenge the previous season’s loss was over, or would be after 48 more minutes of unused timeouts, nap breaks on defense, and watching the Celtic that dribbled the ball over midcourt too often take the shot. It was an ugly performance against an opponent with a knack for drawing out the Celtics’ worst habits, and it was not difficult to see it as the necessary end to something.
I wrote this line with venom and vigor after Game 3: “Joe Mazzulla, one of the few Celtics who hasn’t quit, is the one who is going to have to go when this charade of a series, and the season with it, is mercifully over.”
Wrote this line too: “Their players, as shown through their recent words and pathetic actions, clearly do not believe their coach gives them a fighting chance.” And this: “The Celtics tried to develop a coach with a roster built to win now, and it backfired.”
Now, this is not an apology or a mea culpa. I’m not here to eat crow for Joe. In those circumstances, in that emotional maelstrom of frustration and disappointment, I believe it was the fitting sentiment.
Why the Celtics are chasing perfection down the stretch, even with the East locked up.
Celtics were embarrassingly checked out in Game 3, Mazzulla was overmatched, and it’s not as if I stood alone in disgust. Eddie House, the NBC Sports Boston analyst and 2008 champion, said after Game 3, “I feel like the Celtics have quit on their coach. Call it what we really see. I feel that those guys out there don’t believe in what their coach is doing. … I don’t believe they really believe in Joe Mazzulla.”
I’ll always wonder whether t, he Celtics would have stuck by Mazzulla had they been clobbered in Game 4. But they weren’t. They did not check outgo through the motions, and scatter for the summer. They pulled off three straight victories, by 17 points, 13 points, and then 1 point, with Derrick White’s wonderful put-back at the buzzer suddenly making a Game 7 victory feel inevitable.
It was not. Jayson Tatum rolled his ankle on the first possession, the other Celtics could not overcome it, and the Heat prevailed by 19.
But the Celtics did not roll over when the opportunity presented itself. In a small way, that reflected well on Mazzulla, even though some Celtics seemed to have the attitude of, “We can do this, even if it’s in spite of him.”
Nine months after writing that Mazzulla needed to go, I’m glad that view did not become reality. There would have been an element of genuine unfairness to it, even by the ruthless standards of professional sports.
You know the beats of the story: At 34 years old and having never been a head coach above Division 2 in the college ranks, Mazzulla took over as interim coach on the eve of training camp when Ime Udoka was suspended for violating team policies.
The degree of difficulty was staggering. The Celtics had championship aspirations, a roster of well-meaning but obstinate personalities, and a bond with Udoka that remained strong, as some players questioned why he could not coach them anymore.
And Mazzulla had to navigate all of this while working with a skeleton crew of mostly former Udoka assistants. In retrospect, it was a tribute to the Celtics’ talent and resolve that they got as far as they did. Rather than moving on from or demoting Mazzulla, his most ardent supporter did something wiser. Brad Stevens made things easier for him.
Veteran assistants Sam Cassell and Charles Lee were notable, welcome additions to the coaching staff. Grant Williams, a role player who could gripe to the officials like a superstar, went to Dallas (and didn’t stay long) in a sign-and-trade. Most important, Marcus Smart, the longest-tenured and for better or worse the most headstrong Celtic, was swapped to Memphis in a three-way deal that brought Kristaps Porzingis from Washington.
