76ers too much for Celtics to handle in Game 7: 6 takeaways

Boston Celtics

Embiid outmatched Boston in the paint once again, finishing Saturday’s game with 34 points.

The Celtics had multiple opportunities to extend their season in a wild Game 7 against the 76ers on Saturday, but Joel Embiid and Tyrese Maxey were too much for the third straight game, and the Celtics bowed out in a 109-100 loss. 

Here are the takeaways. 

The Celtics were without Jayson Tatum

Many Celtics fans were already braced for the worst when Jayson Tatum was ruled out for Game 7 with left knee stiffness. 

Mazzulla said before the game that Tatum was day-to-day, so presumably, the Celtics would have been trying to walk a fine line between trying to win games and keep their franchise player healthy if they had advanced (so if you’re looking for a silver lining to the season ending earlier than expected, that’s a small one). 

But after losing two straight games to the Sixers, one thing appeared abundantly clear: This was not a Celtics team capable of winning a championship, and pushing Tatum could have had truly disastrous consequences. Knee soreness is concerning. Knee soreness in the leg that has been compensating for a torn Achilles over the last month of the NBA season isn’t something to ignore.

Tatum and the Celtics knew the stakes. They knew they were on the verge of collapse. They knew how shaky the rest of the East looks at present and how plausible a Finals run would look in a normal year. They knew that sitting Tatum made it more likely than not that they were pulling the plug on their own season. 

You can bet every dollar in your bank account that they did not make that decision lightly, which means you can also bet every dollar in your 401k that it was the right decision for both the player and the franchise. 

The starting lineup was a wild announcement

The absence of Tatum was an earthquake, and the aftershock was nearly as strong: Joe Mazzulla opted to start Derrick White, Jaylen Brown, Baylor Scheierman, Luka Garza and Ron Harper Jr.

The Harper news was eye-catching, but it wasn’t as surprising as one might think. Mazzulla wanted to keep his rotation intact with Payton Pritchard as the first player off the bench, and Harper Jr. slotted in for Tatum. 

More noteworthy, perhaps, was Garza in place of Neemias Queta and Nikola Vucevic, the latter of whom spent Game 7 completely removed from the rotation, which might have been a little too late. Vucevic couldn’t do anything against Embiid in the previous three contests, his 3-pointers weren’t falling, and he was target practice for the Sixers’ guards in drop pick-and-roll coverage. 

Still, Garza also replaced Queta, who struggled mightily all series to stay out of foul trouble and on the floor. 

Garza, however, also struggled with foul trouble, and Queta came in for him … only to struggle once again with foul trouble. 

Mazzulla may have hoped to keep Queta out of foul trouble longer, or he may have simply wanted to see if the Celtics could get out to a lead by pick-and-popping Embiid with Garza. 

In either case, Embiid was a massive problem once again, and the Celtics simply didn’t have the bigs to deal with him, no matter how they started or how they rotated. 

“It was a couple things we saw tactically we wanted to test out,” Mazzulla said. “Obviously, give the series a little bit of a different feel and take advantage of the roster that we had, and take advantage of the guys that can impact plays and whatnot.”

The Sixers are going to be a tough out

Presumably, few readers here want to read extensive writing about the Sixers, but we should acknowledge that this series said a lot more about them than it did about the Celtics. 

Joel Embiid has been much maligned in Boston, and he has deserved a lot of the criticism, but after costing the Sixers Game 4 almost single-handedly, he was utterly dominant in Games 5, 6 and 7. To his enormous credit, he played precisely the brand of basketball the Sixers needed — drawing doubles and dishing, limiting his jumpers, and bruising defenders around the rim. On Saturday, he flopped in ways that might have made some Celtics fans suffer corollary events, but he also gutted through two brutal hits directly to his left knee and showed a level of determination that Boston fans have not seen from him at any point previously in any postseason meeting. He finished with 34 points, 12 rebounds, and six assists.

“What changed in this series was Joel Embiid came back, and they’re a completely different team,” Mazzulla said. “That’s what changed in the series.”

Maxey, meanwhile, burned the Celtics for a hyper-efficient 30 points on 11-for-18 shooting with 11 rebounds and seven assists. He has fully ascended to superstar status, and best wishes to the Knicks in trying to slow him down in the next series. 

This is not the same Sixers team that we’ve seen in previous years. After Embiid, Maxey, VJ Edgecombe and Paul George, the roster looks top heavy, but Embiid’s worst tendencies are balanced out by Maxey’s best ones, which allows him to put a greater emphasis on his own strengths. 

“Give credit to Nick Nurse. Give credit to Philadelphia. They got better,” Brown said. “They’ve gotten better throughout this series. They’re playing good basketball right now. Defensively, I thought they were very, very sound. I give credit to Philadelphia.”

The pre-Tatum rotation gave the Celtics a chance

The odd starting lineup didn’t really do its job — the Celtics were down 32-19 after the first quarter and were showing few signs of life. 

But Jaylen Brown, who started very poorly, came roaring back to life. He finished with 33 points on 12-for-27 shooting, nine rebounds and four assists with Tatum out. Defensively, he matched up 1-on-1 with Embiid multiple times with mixed success, but he gave the Celtics a chance late.

Derrick White started to shake off a tough series, but he cooled off again in the second half and ended up with 26 points on 26 shots, making just five of his 16 3-point attempts. 

Despite his foul trouble, Queta scored 17 points and grabbed 12 rebounds. He was +9 in a game the Celtics lost by nine, which threw his foul trouble into stark relief. 

“It’s a lot of different things that can get you into foul trouble, and I’ve got to start looking at myself and be better, first and foremost,” Queta said. “After that, it’s just being consistent. 

“I’ve shown flashes of where I can be without fouling and it’s just about being consistent with what I do to do that.”

The Celtics went down by double digits multiple times, but they rallied back, and they had a lot of chances to tie or take the lead in the fourth, but their 3-point shooting failed them once again — they finished 13-for-49 (26.5 percent), and they missed every field goal in the final five minutes save for a meaningless layup by Pritchard.

Brown said he wished the Celtics would have gone to their expanded regular-season rotation earlier.

“I wish we played that style and trusted that style more, even throughout the playoffs, even through wins and through losses,” Brown said. “Obviously it’s not always the easiest decision, but I wish that style for our team was how we empowered the rest of our group, and you saw tonight how everybody came out and they played their tail off. 

“I wish we trusted that more.”

Hugo González changed the energy

González was a perfect example — he was out of the rotation for the entire series prior to Game 7, but Mazzulla found himself facing an emergency and broke the glass. 

The Celtics needed his energy badly — trailing by 13 after the first quarter, they looked dispirited and tired. The 20-year-old remedied the latter issue instantly, flying all over the floor and creating extra opportunities with his rebounding, and that frenetic energy seemed to remedy the former as well. 

González made plenty of mistakes, and he missed all three of his 3-point attempts (and both of his free throws), but he was part of the reason the Celtics got back in the game.

What’s next

Ordinarily, we use this final takeaway as a space to highlight the Celtics’ next game, and any other notable events that might be on the horizon. 

Now, however, “what’s next” is a fairly complicated question for the Celtics. 

On the one hand, this team looked like a contender in the regular season. Brown will likely make the All-NBA First Team. Tatum looked healthier than anyone could have hoped (at least until Saturday). Queta looked like a no-brainer starter. Even players like Baylor Scheierman and González showed really encouraging flashes. Brad Stevens might understandably want to consider shoring up some holes around the edges and giving this core another shot next year based on the regular season.

On the other hand, the Celtics aren’t a franchise that celebrates regular-season wins. 

“When you don’t win a championship for the Celtics, there’s always going to be a level of, ‘we have to do better,’” Mazzulla said. 

The problems are obvious. The Celtics lost every game in this series when they shot below 30 percent from three, and they shot sub-30 four times. Mazzulla defended the practice, noting that the Celtics employ a lot of 3-point shooters.

“We go out and get five big men that can post, we’ll post it every single time,” he quipped in response to a question about whether the Celtics will re-evaluate their playing style. 

That, however, is one of the biggest issues the Celtics have: They employ two great players in Brown and Tatum, but to compete at the level they want to achieve, they still need to go all out try to win the margins (offensive rebounding, turnovers), and they still need to make a ton of 3-point shots to win. 

“We got good looks. If we hit them, then nobody says anything,” Pritchard said. “It’s the end of the story. We’ve just got to make them. You win a championship, you make shots.”

The Celtics have the ability to improve on the margins — the full mid-level exception could land them an upgrade at center, for instance — or they could put a line in the water on some of the market’s bigger fish. Giannis Antetokounmpo is almost certainly going to move on. The Nuggets are in turmoil. Anthony Davis might be available for a bargain.

All of that, however, is far in the future. For now, this team is focused on licking its wounds far earlier than anyone expected or wanted.

“Man, I’m so grateful to be with this group,” Brown said. “This group was awesome. I had a fun year. This is probably one of my most fun years playing basketball.”