Getty Marcus Smart, center, of the Celtics
Play six games against each other and NBA teams are not likely to develop much affection for each other. Make those games postseason games, add in a fraught bubble environment to stave off the spread of COVID-19, throw in an exhausting double-overtime grind, and, well, you can expect teams to flat-out despise each other.
That has gotten to be the case with the Celtics and Raptors. After the two teams fought for 52 minutes in Game 6 of the NBA’s East semifinals, they appeared to want to fight a little more, as Celtics guard Marcus Smart began jawing with Toronto’s Fred VanVleet. The teams gathered near midcourt, but Smart was pushed back from the pack by members of the Celtics staff, even as he continued to jaw at the Raptors.
Both teams had some words after the wild 2OT finish 😳
“A lot of emotions and things like that swirling, etc.,” Celtics star Jaylen Brown said after the game. “I ain’t gonna really speak on it too much, but it’s a lot of emotions and it’s an intense series, so things like that tend to happen. A lot of testosterone, etc. Nothing to worry about.
“We gotta be ready to fight. That’s a respectable organization, I expect them to act accordingly, etc. Things seemed to get out of hand at times, from coaching staffs, etc. Let’s keep it under control. Let’s keep playing basketball, let’s be ready to fight.”
Boston Celtics Seeking an Edge for Game 7
For one of the teams, there will be only one more game left to fight about. The Celtics and Raptors will play Game 7 on Friday, with the Miami Heat awaiting the winner. The Heat upended the top-seeded Bucks in the other conference semifinal, winning Game 5 on Tuesday.
According to the NBA’s stats, there have been 137 Game 7s in the history of the league’s playoffs and the team with the higher seed has won Game 7 78.8% of the time. Toronto entered this series as the No. 2 seed and Boston was No. 3.
But the Raptors are fighting some statistical history here, too. They lost the first two games of this series, and teams down 0-2 in the NBA playoffs have come back to win the series only 6.8% of the time.
In the history of the franchise, the Celtics have played 32 Game 7s, and have gone 23-9. Toronto, whose playoff history is much shorter, has played five Game 7s and has gone 3-2. The Raptors beat Philadelphia in seven games during their championship run last year.
Celtics’ Brad Stevens Keeps Team Facing Forward
For the Celtics, one key will be to not look back on the blown opportunities they have had in the series. The most obvious, of course, is Game 3, which the Celtics led with 0.5 seconds to play before Kyle Lowry found O.G. Anunoby in the corner for an open 3-pointer, which he sank as time expired to win the game.
If Boston defends that play, they’re up 3-0 and probably could have ended the series early.
Wednesday’s Game 6 loss had plenty of missed opportunities, too. Jayson Tatum threw away the ball with 1:05 to play in the game for a critical turnover and committed a pointless technical foul down in overtime, giving the Raptors a point that could have made the difference in forcing a second overtime. Kemba Walker missed a big layup at the end of regulation and finished the game with 5 points on 2-for-11 shooting.
As a team, the Celtics were just 2-for-8 shooting in the final 5:19 of regulation.
It’s up to Celtics coach Brad Stevens to get his team to leave all of that in the rearview mirror, though.
“You move on, you control what you can control,” Stevens said, according to MassLive. “We gotta do better, obviously, on a number of possessions. But they were really playing hard, we were really playing hard. Like he said earlier, great basketball game. But we’ll look at what we can clean up but, right now, throw some ice on your legs and get ready for Friday.”
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