The Boston Celtics are leaving San Antonio with a win, but also a pretty significant loss.
Late in the second quarter of the C’s 135-115 win over the Spurs at AT&T Center, star forward Gordon Hayward collided with LaMarcus Aldridge and went to the locker room. Just after halftime, the team announced that Hayward had a fractured left hand.
Now, Hayward (who was spotted wearing a cast in the locker room following the game) reportedly must wait until he sees a specialist Monday to determine just how long he’ll be out.
Celtics head coach Brad Stevens was asked after the game about the injury. And though he couldn’t offer much, he shared what he was able to.
“Broken hand, no timeline, going to get with the doctors tomorrow and decide if he needs to do surgery or not,” Stevens told reporters, as seen on NBC Sports Boston’s Celtics postgame coverage. “Sounds like should he decide (to get surgery), the surgery option might actually be a better timeline. So we’ll see what that all plays out to be, who knows. It’s too bad.
“This one doesn’t feel near as bad as it did two years ago, so he’ll be back, he’ll just be off a few weeks or a month or whatever it is,” Stevens later noted. “I just told him to keep his head up, I think at the end of the day that’s all you can do. He works hard, he’ll be in good shape, he’ll keep himself in good shape and he’ll be ready to go when he gets back. But now he needs to help encourage some of our wings off the bench, they need to be ready to be called upon to add value to winning every night.”
After a bumpy couple of years to start his Celtics tenure due to injury, Hayward finally was rounding into form this season. He entered Saturday’s game averaging 20.3 points, 7.9 rebounds and 4.6 assists per game. He had nine points and two rebounds against the Spurs before departing.
