Celtics Collapse Down the Stretch to put Season on the Brink
May 11, 2022
All was well in TD Garden. With 10 minutes to play in game five on Wednesday, The Celtics had a 93-79 lead, the Bucks called a timeout, and the Garden was going crazy. After a Pat Connaughton three, Jayson Tatum blew by him on the other end for a dunk to put Boston up 13 on what felt like a signature moment that would propel the Celtics to a 3-2 series lead. But over the last 9 minutes, the Bucks showed their championship resilience while the Celtics showed every one of their flaws, resulting in an epic collapse. The Celtics wilted and choked away the lead and let the Bucks steal game five, 110-107, and take back home court advantage. Now The Bucks lead the series 3-2 and will head back to Milwaukee to try and close out the series at home.
From the jump, this game felt wide open and fast paced and that seemed to favor the Celtics. Boston was feeling their way into the game, but was able to find success doing all the things that had been working for the first four games. Tatum and Brower were playing Lopez off the floor in the drop coverage, Derrick White and Daniel Theis both provided great offense off the bench, Marcus Smart and the rest of the Celtics were absolutely hounding Jrue Holiday, and the Celtics were getting out and running, while completely eliminating transition opportunities for the Bucks and cleaning up the glass. Boston played a great second quarter and it felt like they were on the verge of running the Bucks off the floor on multiple occasions, but Tatum made just 2/10 threes on mostly solid looks, the Celts committed a few sloppy turnovers late, and the Bucks made a few big shots. It felt like Boston was up 20, but the lead at half was just 54-47.
Third quarters have been the Celtics bugaboo, and this one didn’t start out great, with the Bucks quickly cutting the lead down to one. But the Celtics were able to get it going and went on a big run, fueled by Jaylenn Brown and Marcus Smart. Brown was amazing, scoring 16 points in the quarter from all three levels, while Smart was getting his hands on everything, forcing turnovers and pushing the ball up the floor. The back and forth pace was a joy to watch and was working wonders for the Celtics. The Bucks tried to go small, but the Celtics targeted the likes of George Hill and especially Grayson Allen relentlessly. After a slow start to the quarter, the Celtics had actually stretched the lead to 86-77. The fourth quarter started off looking like more of the same as Boston built the lead all the way up to 14 and it appeared to all the world that they were about to coast to a massive victory.
Then came the collapse for the ages. To put it simply, the Celtics stopped playing. All of the beautiful ball movement, pace, and kick outs disappeared. They started trying to run out the clock with way too much time left. Possession after possession, it was all dribbling, no passing, and settling for a late clock jump shot with no second chances. Rinse and repeat. Over and over. One empty trip after another, while the Bucks slowly but steadily chipped away at the other end. Boston showed the ugliest version of themselves, devolving into iso mode and refusing to do anything but dribble and hoist contested long jumpers. The Celtics attacking offense in the early minutes of the quarter that built up the lead actually got them in the bonus with over eight minutes left in the quarter, but the team stopped being aggressive and failed to take advantage. Not only were they not going to the hoop, they weren’t driving and kicking, or really swinging the ball in general, as evidenced by the fact that Boston did not even attempt a single three point field goal in the quarter.
As bad as the Celtics were down the stretch, the Bucks deserve a ton of credit. They looked defeated on multiple occasions, but simply refused to quit. Every time things looked bleak they would come back with a huge shot and they never let things truly slip away, staying just close enough to give themselves a chance. And once the Celtics took their foot off the gas, the Bucks took that chance and didn’t waste it. The Celtics went back to their small lineup that closed out game four, but this time Mike Budenholzer and the Bucks countered by inserting Bobby Portis into their closing lineup for George Hill. This counter resulted in a dominant size advantage for the Bucks, that helped them abuse the Celtics on the offensive glass. During their fourth quarter run, the Bucks had 10 second chance points and 9 points off of turnovers. The Bucks had a whopping 17 offensive rebounds for the game, many in the fourth quarter when Boston simply could not finish off a possession.
Tatum led the way for the Celtics, and was consistent in his scoring but he could simply never get his shots to fall consistently, finishing with 34 points, but on 12/29 shooting and 2/11 from three. The approach was good for most of the game, until down the stretch when he kept going iso and hoisting midrange jumpers that generally weren’t falling. Brown pitched in with 26, 8, and 6, but most of that production came in the third quarter. Down the stretch the Celtics just had absolutely nothing going on offense, with the only meaningful field goal coming from an Al Horford putback dunk that put the Celtics up 105-99 with just over two minutes to play. The next trip down, the Celtics got a stop, but gave up another offensive rebound which led to a backbreaker of a three by Giannis to cut the lead to three. After two more empty Celtics possessions, Jrue Holiday buried a big three which tied things at 105 with 42 seconds to play. Tatum had one of his only strong drives of the quarter, drawing a foul and hitting both free throws to put Boston back up by 2, and then Grant Williams fouled Giannis with 14 seconds left.
Giannis hit the first free throw but missed the second one to the right. Marcus Smart came crashing in to secure the rebound, but unfortunately Jaylen Brown crashed into him from the other side of the lane, preventing both players from securing the rebound. The loose ball bounced into the waiting arms of Bobby Portis who popped it in to give the Bucks their first lead of the second half at 108-107 with 11 seconds remaining. The Celtics used their final timeout to advance the ball and draw up a play for Tatum to curl off a screen from Horford in the opposite corner. But that action was too slow in developing so Derrick White threw the ball to Smart who popped open in the near corner. Smart got a step on Connaughton and had an angle for a baseline layup, but Holiday came out of nowhere to block the shot, and then managed to throw the ball off Smart and out of bounds with six seconds left. Connaughton knocked down a pair of free throws and the Celtics never even got off a shot attempt as Holiday came up with another steal as time expired, securing a huge Bucks victory and completing a legendary comeback for the defending champs.
For the Celtics, this is about as demoralizing as it gets. A 3-2 lead was firmly within their grasp and as Ime Udoka said, they “let a golden opportunity” slip away. Now the Celtics must win two games in a row, and save their season on Friday night in Milwaukee. The worst traits of the Celtics, that plagued this team for the first few months of the season reared their ugly heads at the worst possible time. The Bucks showed why they are the champions and Giannis Antetokounmpo showed why he is the best player in the world. The defense on Giannis was solid yet again, but he simply would not be denied, ending up with 40 points on 16/27 shooting. Holiday added 24, 8, and 8 on 9/24 shooting, but he saved his best play for the most important moments. The Celtics had the champs on the ropes, but they took the punch and were able to get back up. This quarter was a good reminder of how young of a team the Celtics are. These are the kinds of losses that teams on the rise generally have to experience before achieving the ultimate prize. Hopefully this will serve as a great learning experience for the Celtics, and we will look back on this loss as a turning point and something that ultimately made them stronger and more poised. But at the moment, it’s certainly hard to see it that way. It’s hard to see it as anything other than a devastating loss that may very well end a magical season.
Now the Celtics need to bounce back. The way they respond to this will say a lot about the makeup of this team. If they are as tough and motivated as we think, they will show resolve and use this loss as fuel to come out with a purpose and battle back. We know they are capable. They have shown it time and again throughout the season. But this will be the biggest test by far. Against the best player in the world, and the defending champions, the Celtics will need to come together as a team and play their best basketball of the season. The alternative, of course, is that this loss has broken the Celtics. This is the kind of collapse that has broken the will of many teams and been too much to overcome. Hopefully this is not the case for our Celtics. Hopefully they will come out ready to fight and realize that this series is not over. This certainly feels like rock bottom, and maybe it is. But we will learn a lot about the Celtics on Friday night one way or the other.
Ben Handler