Don’t panic Celtics fans. Game 1 might have been an outlier for Boston’s play.
It’s been a rough couple days for Isaiah Thomas. As he tragically lost his sister, Chyna Thomas, in a car accident Saturday morning and then somehow played the very next day in Game 1, which shows how strong he really is. While his 33 points might not have been enough to carry the Boston Celtics to a win, there is no need to panic, it’s only Game 1.
You can’t really put the blame on Thomas for the loss on Sunday, as he was the leading scorer. But it just seemed like he wasn’t completely into the game. We all know Thomas to be the emotional leader of the Celtics, and that all seemed to go away Sunday against the Bulls. Thomas wasn’t able to fire up his teammates and get able them going like he usually does, which all is completely understandable.
Now, obviously, the Celtics aren’t making any excuses, as Al Horford told reporters “We’re never going to make excuses, but this is hard”.
Some Celtics fans may be worrying and NBA fans may say that Boston won’t win this series against the Bulls. But not so fast, just take a deep breath and relax, as this is only the first game of the series. Reading a lot of predictions before the playoffs began, CelticsBlog may have gotten it right on the money:
"The Bulls will win one of the first 2 games in Boston. Everyone will flip out. Talk shows will have a field day. National talking heads will say “I told you so” and discuss the chances of an 8 seed upsetting a 1 seed. They’ll bring up the “TNT Bulls.” They’ll call the Celtics a “fake 1 seed” and patronizingly explain to us how the playoffs are different than the regular season. Then the Celtics will win in 5 games."
People are going to bring up how the Celtics are “the worst top seed in the history of the NBA” and how they will lose to an 8 seed. Game 1s are notorious for overreaction in the NBA. But if you really look at it, there’s nothing to worry about if you’re the Celtics, and here’s why.
- Clearly, this has been extremely hard for Thomas the past couple days and it’s even affected the rest of the team. Not saying it won’t be hard moving forward, but now that the team has had a few days to recuperate from this devastating news of Thomas’ sister, they should do a better job rallying around him in these games. Expect the Celtics players to rally and lift Thomas back to his normal, fiery self.
- Boston’s defense really had no answer for Bobby Portis and Jimmy Butler in Game 1. While Butler may be difficult to shut down, Avery Bradley and the Celtics did a great job of limiting Chicago’s star to just 7 first half points. You can expect Boston to do a much better job of limiting Portis as he had the game of his life as he scored 19 points on 8 of 10 shooting with 9 rebounds. Now that the Celtics know what Portis is capable of, it will be hard for him to have a duplicate performance in Game 2.
- It’s going to be difficult for the Celtics to get outrebounded as bad as they did on Sunday. Boston got outrebounded 53-36 while allowing 20 offensive boards leading to 23 second-chance points. With having gone through that awfully rebounded game, the Celtics will make big changes with how they go after rebounds.
Next: Isaiah Thomas will Play in Game 2 vs Bulls
In general, the Boston Celtics have had time to assess and adjust what all went wrong in Game 1. Expect them to come back hot and better on both ends of the floor.