Cavaliers can wait; let the Celtics savor what they have accomplished
Al Horford is just 31 years old, younger than Boston sports contemporaries Patrice Bergeron, Julian Edelman, and his utter opposite in dependability, David Price.
He is a young man in the real world and a player still thriving in the back end of his prime as an NBA player. It’s a fine place to be, especially when you have a nine-figure contract already in your back pocket.
But to his Celtics teammates, every one of whom is his junior, he’s the big brother, and when they’re in the mood to needle him, the team dad. Horford laughs it off, just as a dad would, because as much as the kids needle him, he knows they respectfully follow his lead, and often that takes the Celtics to exactly where they want to be.
During Wednesday’s tense and rewarding 114-112 victory over the Sixers — a win that clinched the Eastern Conference semifinal series and advanced the Celtics to an enticing showdown with LeBron James and his Cleveland chorus of mediocre backup singers — Horford was outstanding, especially in the fourth quarter when he tallied 6 crucial points, 3 rebounds, 2 assists, and 2 steals.
When it was all over, and the Celtics had locked up a spot in the Eastern finals for the second straight year despite losing All-Star forward Gordon Hayward for the year in the first half of the first quarter of the first game of the season and superstar guard Kyrie Irving just as they were starting to gear up for the playoffs, Horford wasn’t particularly interested in looking ahead. He obliged the media by discussing what he and his young teammates had just achieved.
But most of all, he wanted what pretty much every dad wants after an exhausting day: a good night’s sleep.
“That was a taxing game for us, we left it all out there, and I’m going to be completely honest,’’ said Horford, a small smile creasing his face as he was asked whether the Celtics can overcome any challenge, “I can’t really think of anything else right now. I’m just really proud of our group. Our guys really fought.’’
In other words: Spoils for the victors? Sure, that would nice. How about a nice hammock and, oh, an uninterrupted daylong nap?
Jaylen Brown, a decade Horford’s junior and yet similarly articulate and understated, sat to Horford’s right on the postgame podium and followed his lead.
“Ah, yeah, I second everything he just said,’’ deadpanned Brown.
Boston Celtics guard Jaylen Brown reacts after hitting a 3-pointer against the Philadelphia 76ers during the third quarter of Game 5.
The Celtics’ reluctance to look ahead to the Cleveland series is a prudent one. They don’t just deserve a break after adding the variable of defeat to the favored Sixers’ process. They actually have one, with three days off until Game 1 Sunday, and their coach, Brad Stevens, implored them to “get outside’’ Thursday and escape from basketball for a few hours.
It’s wise advice, especially — sarcasm alert — coming from a coach who couldn’t even muster a single Coach of the Year vote from his peers. (What petty nonsense.) Better, with the Celtics getting that necessary rest, it allows us to follow Horford’s lead as well in a sense and hold off on looking ahead.
We’ll get to that soon enough in the coming days. Right now, let’s hang on to the moment, because Game 5 is one to savor.
It was hardly just Horford (15 points, 8 rebounds, 5 steals, 3 assists, three or four crucial plays in the fourth quarter) who got it done. Almost to a man, the young guys came through time and again, and good thing they did. The tenor of the series would have changed had the Sixers won, with Game 6 back in Philly, where they’d won Game 4.
“I was saying it from the jump,’’ said Brown. “This is Game 7.’’
Brown played with such urgency, and delivered one of the best all-around games of his career. Starting for the first time since a hamstring injury suffered in the first round kept him out of Game 1, Brown scored 24 points on 10-of-13 shooting, grabbed 4 rebounds, and badgered overwhelmed Sixers phenom Ben Simmons on defense.
It was a performance that might be overlooked given all of the other crazy developments, but it should not be. Brown, playing with an injury that would keep lesser competitors out for a week or more, was often the best player on the court.
The Celtics featured their usual post-Kyrie balanced scoring, with six players getting 13-25 points. The high scorer was Jayson Tatum (25), who reached 20-plus for the sixth straight game. Ten of his points came in the fourth quarter, including 6 on six attempts from the foul line.
It was a remarkable display of talent and poise. A season ago, he was a freshman at Duke whose stretches of dominance were mixed in with the occasional meh performance, such as a 10-point effort against Maine. Now he’s out there doing the same things that put Paul Pierce’s No. 34 in the rafters. The kid is already a star, one who isn’t going to stop ascending anytime soon.
We cannot forget, too, that this was the quintessential Marcus Smart game, especially the sequence in the final seconds, when he missed a free throw he was trying to make, made one he was trying to miss, then sprinted back on defense with the determination of Ronnie Lott to intercept the Sixers’ attempt at breaking the Celtics’ hearts.
Smart is an enigma, but damned if he isn’t an enigma you want on your side.
“If it came down to anybody coming up with it, everybody has got their money on Smart,’’ said Brown, prompting Horford to nod in agreement.
One reason this victory is so rewarding, one worth lingering on, is the worthiness of the foe. The Sixers’ young stars weren’t quite ready for prime time. Simmons’s lack of a shot was exposed over and over again. He can have the day off today, but he’d better be in the gym tomorrow.
Joel Embiid scored 27 points, tied with savvy Dario Saric for the team lead, but the big man, obnoxious on the court but gracious in defeat, remains mistake-prone when he’s doing anything with the ball but shooting it.
Yet the Sixers never relented, rallying from a 61-52 deficit at halftime, and bouncing back again late in the fourth quarter to take a 4-point lead with 1:39 left.
“Any time we got a semblance of a lead, they crushed it,’’ said Stevens.
The home team pulled it out, thanks to myriad big plays from assorted Celtics just when they had to come through. They’re the better team now, but the Sixers are going to have their chances for revenge in the future. The old rivalry is finally renewed.
“If we do anything of significance,’’ said Sixers coach Brett Brown, “we’re going to have to go through the Boston Celtics.’’
Various NBA teams are going to be saying that in the future. And not to look ahead on this day of rest, but the Cavs had better realize it, too. The Celtics have lost a lot of talent along the way this season. They haven’t lost much else. At this point, anyone who finds their success a surprise is in for one themselves.
