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7 takeaways from the Celtics’ end-of-the-season press conferences
Jayson Tatum discussed his injury status as the Celtics brought this season to a close.
Celtics players wrapped up their end-of-the-season press conferences on Sunday afternoon at the Auerbach Center.
Jayson Tatum, who missed Saturday night’s Game 7 loss against Philadelphia, had the lengthiest of the press conferences, taking questions about the knee injury that prevented him from playing among other topics.
Sam Hauser, Baylor Scheierman, and Luka Garza also spoke. This was a catch-up session, allowing those who didn’t speak after last night’s game a chance to make one more trip to the podium and address the media before going away for the offseason.
Since it will be a while before we hear from the players again, here are a few takeaways from what they said on Saturday night and Sunday morning.
Tatum on his injury
There wasn’t much notice beforehand that Tatum would miss Game 7.
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Joe Mazzulla said the decision was made about 20 minutes before his pregame press conference which started at 5:45 p.m. on Saturday, and he added that it wasn’t Tatum’s choice — he and the medical team decided that it would be best for him not to play.
After waiting through a ten-month long recovery process folllowing Tatum’s offseason surgery to repair a ruptured Achilles’ tendon, Boston chose to proceed with caution.
Tatum told reporters on Monday that the stiffness in his knee would be evaluated on a day-to-day basis. He added that he was confident that he would have been able to play in the second round if the Celtics advanced.
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“Experienced some tightness back there,” Tatum said. “It was just unfortunate timing but it was, I guess, a little bit to be expected. I was away for ten-and-a-half months and then I’m back and I’m playing every other day.”
“I’m playing 36-40 minutes, so it’s not unusual that something would come up. It was just kind of tough because rehab was going so well the entire time. I guess it was kind of inevitable that I would have to deal with something and it just came at the worst time.”
Still believing in the style
The Celtics stuck with a heavy dose of 3-pointers throughout the series, once again riding the ups and downs of such a strategy.
This is the second-season in a row where a cold streak prompted an early playoff exit. Boston took a league-high 46.1 3-pointers per game during the playoffs. They made 33.7 percent of their attempts from beyond the arc, which was ninth among the 16 playoff teams.
The Celtics ranked 13th or worse in free-throw attempts, points in the paint, fast-break points, and points off of turnovers. They struggled to get easy looks throughout the series, especially late in games.
Several players said they got good looks, but failed to knock them down. Mazzulla was asked if he felt the team had become too reliant on jump-shooting.
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“I thought we did a great job of reading the 2-on-1s, taking what the defense gave us, and in the games we lost the other team shot over 38 percent from three,” Mazzulla said. “You’ve got to make shots. You have to be able to do that. It’s something we’ve done well, something we do well, and we just didn’t … I love the looks that we got, love the process that we had, but hate the result.”
Mazzulla’s explanation for Game 7 starting lineup
The Celtics played a starting-five that they had never used before in Game 7: Jaylen Brown, Derrick White, Scheierman, Garza, and Ron Harper Jr.
All but two of those starters went scoreless. Part of the criticism around Mazzulla’s coaching was a lack of adjustments during the bulk of the series. Then, in the final game, he went with a brand-new lineup.
“There were a couple of things we saw tactically that we wanted to test out,” Mazzulla said. “Give the series a little bit of a different feel and take advantage of the roster that we had and take advantage of the guys that can impact plays and whatnot.”
Celtics had zero answers for Joel Embiid
Joel Embiid’s presence was obviously a game-changer for Philadelphia, which won three of the four games he played in this series.
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Boston threw everything it could at him defensively — bigs, guards, single coverages, double-teams, even a little zone action at the end. Embiid still picked them apart despite having an emergency appendectomy three weeks prior and visibly limping during his time on the court.
“We tried a bunch of things and he just — he’s a big body,” Brown said. “He also got some extra calls he was flopping around and stuff like that and they rewarded him for that but that’s the league that we’re in.”
An streaky end to a disappointing series for Derrick White
The Celtics, in general, were starved for offense during the back half of the series.
But, White’s struggles were a continuation from the regular-season. He shot less that 40 percent from the field in the regular-season and postseason. He had his moments in Game 7, but finished 9-for-26 from the field.
The typically-dependable guard said there is a lot to work on in the offseason.
“I’ll definitely remember a lot of the great times that we had, but you also remember the bad times and this moment right here. It’s going to be a long summer and I’ve got to get better.”
Exits getting earlier and earlier
This is the earliest the Celtics have been knocked out of the playoffs since 2020. After winning the title in 2024, they’ve now lost in the conference semifinals to the Knicks and in the opening round against Philadelphia.
With the core of Tatum, Brown, White, and Pritchard intact, these Celtics should be able to remain competitive with some roster and coaching tweaks.
But, for the second-straight year, they’ve faced an early exit with Tatum on the sidelines with an injury.
Future is still bright
Ultimately, the Celtics fell short, losing to a franchise that had not beaten them in a playoff series since the ’80s until this weekend.
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But, getting 56 wins while playing most of the season without Tatum is still a feat. The Celtics got younger this year, and the organization has shown a knack for developing young players.
“When you start a season, you think you’re going to be playing until June every single year,” Hauser said. “That’s the expectation, especially being in Boston and with the Celtics. The standard is a championship, and when you fall short of that, it’s disappointing.”
“But, there’s a lot of good that we can take from this year and a lot of things that we can build off of. Like Baylor, Hugo, Jordan, Luka, like those guys, they had to play a huge role for us this year, and did really well.”
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