BOSTON — Al Horford having to stop practice on the eve of the Eastern Conference finals with the Celtics not taking it seriously enough was a sign that Boston didn’t have the right mindset heading into Game 1 against the Miami Heat.
And at points it looked like the mindset carried over with the Celtics stumbling in the series opener to fall to the Heat, 123-116, at TD Garden on Wednesday night.
While many things went wrong for the Celtics, head coach Joe Mazzulla vehemently pushed back on if preparedness was an issue as he got into a testy exchange with a reporter after the defeat.
“We were prepared. We play harder in the first half and then they outplayed us for one quarter,” Mazzulla said. “So, we were prepared for it. We had the right mindset heading into the game.”
Mazzulla then cut off the reporter, reiterating what he had just stated.
“We had the right mindset heading into the game and we were prepared,” Mazzulla said.
Mazzulla on several occasions pointed out that the Celtics outscored the Heat in three out of the four quarters. He did acknowledge that the third quarter made all the difference with the Celtics getting beaten down, 46-25, in the frame. But Mazzulla believed the third-quarter problems had nothing to do with preparation.
“It did, but we were prepared and then we let go of the rope,” Mazzulla said. “There’s two storylines here it’s one, we were ready to play and we had a great job executing on both ends of the floor in the first half and it’s about the consistency of them willing to continue to play. So, we have to be prepared when we will do outplay them and they’re going to respond and we have to respond. We were prepared. We just let go of the rope.”
Mazzulla’s timeout usage came into question again as he only used a single timeout in the third quarter with the game tied, 78-all. He then watched as the Heat went on a 25-13 run over the final 6:28 of the quarter to take a 12-point lead into the final frame after Miami had trailed by 12 early to start the third.
“I called two in the first quarter,” Mazzulla said. “I don’t call two in the first quarter, save it for the third quarter, right?”
