It’s imperative that this Celtics-Heat series ends Wednesday
No letdowns. No allowing the Heat a flicker of hope. No tempting fate.
This cannot be forgotten in the haze of the troubling news and fear of further bad news to come.
This cannot be smothered by the concern that engulfed Celtics fans Monday night when Kristaps Porzingis – the unicorn, the presumed missing piece, the happiest darned Celtic you have ever seen – hobbled off the court with 2 minutes, 27 seconds remaining in the second quarter, a scene that looked an awful lot like the kind that preface prolonged absences.
This can’t get lost.
This can’t be forgotten.
The Celtics came down to Miami and did precisely what they had to do.
After the Heat tied the series with a scorching outlier of a shooting performance (a franchise-playoff-record 23 made 3-pointers) in a 10-point Game 2 victory in Boston, those old worries about the Celtics’ ability to handle prosperity – not to mention a feisty, sensationally-coached underdog – came whooshing back.
Turns out the Heat had no more outliers at their disposal in their place. The Celtics won Saturday’s Game 3 by 20 points and Monday’s Game 4 by 14 after leading by as many as 28 points.
The star for the Celtics was not Jayson Tatum (who played a solid all-around game with 20 points and 11 rebounds, but did not attempt a shot until less than 2 minutes remained in the first quarter), and Jaylen Brown (17 points on 7 of 18 shooting, 6 turnovers) looked suspiciously like Oshae Brissett at times.
The star, without debate, was Derrick White. He scored a career-high 38 points – 16 coming in the first quarter – hit eight 3-pointers, blocked 3 shots, and delivered so many highlights and huge buckets that it’s hard to choose just one.
So, hey, why not choose two? They are remarkably similar and happened within a minute of each other in the third quarter. With 6:31 remaining in the third quarter, Jrue Holiday zipped a pass to White underneath for a rapid-fire dunk, which should have been an and-1. At 5:50, Holiday and White connected for a near-identical play and another dunk, building the Celtic lead to 67-41.
For the record and just because, our third choice for a White highlight would be the contested 3 he buried in Duncan Robinson’s face with less than 5 minutes remaining in the first half for a 44-31 lead.
The unwavering confidence that White displays now didn’t seem possible when he arrived from the Spurs in-season in 2022 and sometimes played with a palpable just-trying-to-fit-in tentativeness. Now he delivers sensational all-around performances and memorable moments so often that to designate one of them (such as this) the Derrick White Game ultimately serves as a reminder that there have been a lot of Derrick White Games during Joe Mazzulla’s tenure.
It must also be noted that White delivered the dagger 3-pointer with 49.5 seconds left. The outcome wasn’t really in doubt, but the Heat have this way of tricking you into thinking a game is close when your team is up, oh, 13 points with a minute and 10 seconds left. They make you do the math, force you to acknowledge those creeping thoughts about how it would unfold if it all went wrong.
It’s stressful, and some of it stems from old Celtics habits and unwelcome flashbacks to past clashes with better Heat teams. Mostly, though, it’s just how an NBA game ebbs and flows.
White ended whatever suspense remained, real or imagined, providing one more piece of evidence that the Celtics are at their best when the ball finds his hands.
Ultimately, they were hardly flawless, but the Celtics achieved what was necessary in Miami. As they head home for Wednesday’s Game 5, it’s imperative that they do so again.
No letdowns. No allowing the Heat a flicker of hope. No tempting fate.
Make the if-necessaries unnecessary.
The Porzingis injury hovers over everything, of course. The sequence leading up to it was so strange, maybe ominous in retrospect. With 3 minutes, 13 seconds left in the half, he came up hobbling after appearing to step on the foot of the Heat’s Tyler Herro.
Not 20 seconds after that, he got trucked by human bumper-car Bam Adebayo – who later would step into Jayson Tatum’s airspace to contest a shot after the whistle, leading to Tatum landing on his foot and rolling his ankle. (He seemed fine, but those instant flashbacks to Game 7 of the conference finals last year, when he was injured on the first play, were not pleasant.)
Porzingis hobbled around after rolling his ankle and colliding with Adebayo, and with the benefit of hindsight, it’s somewhat surprising that Mazzulla, one of his many assistants, or one of the assistants to the assistants didn’t try to pause the game to get him out right there.
It would be pure speculation to wonder if the minutes before the injury – described as a calf strain – enhanced the possibility of its occurrence, which happened when he pushed off with his right leg after taking a pass from Brown and immediately pulled up and signaled to come out of the game.
What we do know is what ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski reported: that Porzingis did not appear to have an Achilles’ injury but would undergo imaging on the calf on Tuesday.
Porzingis missed seven games earlier this season with a calf problem, and common sense suggests he won’t be on the court for a while.
While we await more specifics, the natural question is, how long can the Celtics continue their very real quest for Banner 18 without him?
The answer? This series, and maybe the next against the winner of the Cavaliers/Magic matchup. The Knicks, whose strengths, such as relentless offensive rebounding, can exploit Boston weaknesses, would be a scary matchup if the Celtics were minus Porzingis in the East finals.
But that’s a worry for later. The Celtics have to take care of business, again, for a third straight game, against the Heat. That will buy Porzingis a head start on his recovery, should the Cavs-Magic series go to the limit. It will buy everyone else some necessary rest, if hardly relaxation.
The NBA playoffs are both an endurance test and an obstacle course. One of their own, one of their best, is limping, but the Celtics cannot slow down now.
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