The Celtics are the measuring stick in the Eastern Conference
The NBA is chasing the Celtics now, not the other way around.
On the night before the trade deadline, after the Celtics once again defeated the 76ers and didn’t even need Al Horford to do it this time, Joel Embiid wearily answered the same questions he has answered so many times before.
The Celtics won, huh?
“They made 10 more threes than us,” Embiid said. “That’s really the game.”
Why couldn’t he score?
“Obviously they started doubling every possession, they started crowding the paint, so I really had no lane to drive, so I thought I made the right plays all game, especially in the third quarter. We just didn’t make shots.”
Did Luke Kornet bother you with his patented Kornet Kontest?
“Whatever. We lost the game.”
Why does Boston give you so much trouble?
At this, Embiid paused for a moment and seemed to choose his words carefully.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I think, I mean, I don’t know. There’s a lot of holes. But you just got to go out there and play with a lot of effort. They went to the Finals and they got the best record in the league for a reason. We just got to do the best job possible. That’s a really good team.”
Embiid has taken a lot of body blows from the Celtics over the years, but he isn’t the only superstar absorbing them. Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving – one passively and one actively – watched their team get annihilated by the Celtics just a week before the trade deadline, and neither player is employed by the Nets any more. Giannis Antetokounmpo beat the Celtics in the postseason in 2019 when Irving seemingly decided he was ready to spend the summer in Brooklyn, but he has lost in the postseason a lot more than he has won against a Celtics team based around Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown.
The Celtics have not won a championship since 2008. Last year’s trip to the Finals was bruising and difficult, and after nearly falling to both the Bucks and Heat, they came up short against an aging-but-still-toothy Warriors team that cemented its dynastic legacy by beating them.
In other words, the Celtics still have a lot to prove, and they will affirm that at any available opportunity.
“We’ve still got a long way to go, because it’s not done until we win a championship,” Tatum said only last week, when asked how he and Jaylen Brown have grown as a duo.
But one thing is clear as the dust from the NBA’s trade deadline settles: The Celtics are now the high-water level in the Eastern Conference. They no longer have to construct a team to compete against LeBron James or Giannis Antetokounmpo. Instead, they made small moves to shore up whatever cracks they can find in their own roster.
Meanwhile, other teams measure themselves against the Celtics and try to load up to face them specifically – a tall task with limited resources. That’s why the 76ers just traded Matisse Thybulle and acquired Jalen McDaniels (a versatile wing defender who simply has not had anything for Jayson Tatum in the last few meetings between the Celtics and Hornets). That’s why the Bucks dealt five second-round picks to bring on Jae Crowder (a versatile wing defender who doesn’t solve the problem of Al Horford and Grant Williams against Giannis Antetokounmpo).
And that’s also part of the reason why the trade that sent Kevin Durant to Phoenix is so interesting when examined through a Celtics-tinted lens. Durant – who is 34 years old and more injury-prone than he used to be – wants to win a championship right now, and joining the Suns gave him a better opportunity than the Nets could offer (and, of course, gives him a warmer weather locale to call home). The Suns gave up their future in draft capital as well as Mikal Bridges to employ a 37-year-old Chris Paul and a 34-year-old Durant, but they undeniably have a chance to win a title as a two-way powerhouse.
In the process, Durant cleared the path a little bit for the Celtics to get to the Finals. The Celtics swept the Nets last year, but this year’s iteration could have been tougher – Dorian Finney-Smith and Durant would be a great pair of wing defenders to try to counter the Celtics, and they certainly made them more versatile defensively than they were with Irving on the floor. Still, a fully healthy Celtics team is significantly deeper and would have been favored.
That’s not to say the Celtics are guaranteed a trip to the Finals after all of the activity on Thursday. The Bucks took them to seven games without Khris Middleton last season, and Antetokounmpo remains a deserving MVP candidate. Jimmy Butler will find a way to make sure you don’t look past Jimmy Butler. The Cavaliers gave them fits in their two meetings with length at the rim and athletic scoring on the perimeter.
But as another trade deadline wraps up, the Celtics’ team-building as defending Eastern Conference champions is noteworthy. They acquired Mike Muscala and otherwise stood pat. Nothing else is really necessary at this stage – Tatum and Brown haven’t won a title together yet, but through half of the NBA’s 2022-23 regular season, they have helped set the Celtics apart as the league’s clear standard.
Other teams need to prove they can keep up.
To comment, please create a screen name in your profile
To comment, please verify your email address
Conversation
This discussion has ended. Please join elsewhere on Boston.com