There really was no area that could be defined as “good” for the Boston Celtics.
They were awful on the attacking end and porous defensively. The end result was a deserved 125-104 beatdown at the hands of the young Charlotte Hornets — who were without Gordon Hayward, LaMelo Ball and Malik Monk.
Seriously, there basically were no positives to take from the game, and Brad Stevens, rightfully, admitted his team was just bad Sunday afternoon.
“We got outplayed, out-coached, out-hustled,” Stevens said after the game, via NBC Sports Boston. “They were the better team today. I thought their speed gave us fits and they really pushed the ball. And when they got to halfcourt, they kept it flying around, I thought we were slow to move it and they were fast to move it. And I thought — I said this to the team at halftime — we were guarding them like we were expecting to play against ourselves, like we were going to hold it for an extra dribble.”
There also was this from Stevens, via The Athletic’s Jared Weiss.: “This team hasn’t won a game all year where we’ve played subpar.”
After winning six straight games, the Celtics now have lost three of their last four, returning to the uniquely frustrating form that’s defined most of their season. With each passing game, it seems increasingly likely that they’ll be in the play-in tournament, a deserved fate for this underachieving group.
