All Eyes Forward: Celtics Have United Message After Game 5 Loss

BOSTON — The Celtics are now in an all too familiar position.

Stop us if this sounds familiar.

The Celtics enter Game 6 of their Eastern Conference semifinals matchup down 3-2, needing to win a game on the road after dropping a pivotal Game 5 on their home court at TD Garden. Is that ringing a bell? It should, because it happened just last year against the Milwaukee Bucks.

The cautionary tale was one that was known prior to Tuesday night’s ugly loss to the Philadelphia 76ers, but didn’t prevent the disastrous outcome that seemed inevitable. The bad news? Boston now, for the second season in a row, will have to win back-to-back games in its quest to reach the Eastern Conference finals. The good news? The message is the same to a man. The Celtics know they can do this because they have before.

“We’ve been in that position before and we didn’t play well today,” Jayson Tatum said following the 115-103 Game 5 defeat. “The fans could see it. You guys saw it. We know. … We’ve been in this position before and regardless we were going to have to go back to Philly anyway. Now it’s a little bit tougher, but it’s nothing that we can’t do. Everybody believes that.”

How can the Celtics do it? Boston head coach Joe Mazzulla and star guard Jaylen Brown agree that it starts with focusing on themselves.

“I think we just have to stick together and focus on the little things,” Mazzulla said. “We’ve been able to bounce back from games before. You can’t really rely on the fact — you can’t control the other team. The only thing we can control is how we come out and play on Thursday.”

“We’ve got to have a short-term memory,” Brown said. “We dropped the ball tonight. … Last year is over with. We have to come out and be better than we were tonight or we’ll have a different ending. Obviously, we’re still in this series, but we have to muster up whatever we have left to be better for Game 6.

“We’ve got a resilient group. Tonight it just seemed like the door wasn’t opening. It seemed like we couldn’t get anything going, but every game has its own story and that’s the beauty of basketball. I believe in my guys. I think that we can come out and be inspired the next game.”