Celtics’ Joe Mazzulla, Grant Williams Ejected Amid Disastrous Half

The Boston Celtics’ insane stretch to start the season came to a screeching halt Monday.

Boston entered its matchup against the Chicago Bulls as the NBA’s hottest team. At 3-0, the Celtics had thoroughly dominated opponents over a first week of the season that saw Jayson Tatum win Eastern Conference Player of the Week. Eventually, that pace would have to let up, and it did in a big way.

In the midst of a sustained Chicago run, interim head coach Joe Mazzulla was given two technical fouls and subsequently ejected from the game for shouting across the court at officials. The fouls came one after the other, with veteran referee Mark Davis making the final call to give the rookie coach the boot.

Just minutes later, forward Grant Williams was tossed for making contact with an official after committing a shooting foul.

Both calls were questionable, to say the least.

Williams looked like he was trying to get away from the situation, but he inadvertently made contact with a referee in doing so. That is grounds for an automatic ejection in the NBA. You can find the video here.

Boston would end up dropping its first game of the season, 120-102, without Mazzulla and Williams for parts of the second half.