While the Boston Celtics are fresh off a win over the Indiana Pacers on Tuesday, the team appears it’s still not over a pair of devastating losses in the last two weeks.
The defeats — against the Brooklyn Nets and Oklahoma City Thunder — will be hard to overlook throughout the remainder of the regular season. And Celtics head coach Brad Stevens fully understands that.
Stevens also knows how hen specifically played a role in the defeats and explained that he hopes it will be a thing of the past while appearing on 98.5 The Sports Hub’s “Zolak & Bertrand” show Wednesday.
“It’s not necessarily any one group, not any one person, we just all have to be better as a team. And me as a coach, I’ve got to help put us in the better positions to do that,” Stevens told the radio station. “There’s certainly times after every game, but after those close losses, you go back and you just, I mean I would hope nobody is harder on me than me. And I deserved it.
“After that Brooklyn game, it was just brutal to watch. It was brutal to think about,” Stevens said, in regards to the Celtics allowing 51 fourth-quarter points before losing the game in overtime. “In Oklahoma City, the very end, obviously, we would have liked to have back. But those are things you make sure you don’t put yourself in that position again.”
The Celtics narrowly escaped being in the same position against the Pacers as Boston watched its 16-point, fourth-quarter lead disappear down the stretch. Fortunately, the Celtics were able to right their previous wrongs and ultimately pull out the win, which Stevens said they “probably needed.”
The C’s will return to action Friday as they travel to the Eastern Conference-leading Milwaukee Bucks.
