The table was set for the Thunder to go on a dynastic run after winning their first championship in 2025. They had a young MVP about to hit his prime, flanked by two All-NBA caliber players under age 25, defensive pests wherever you looked, more depth than they knew what to do with, a solid mix of veterans and youth, and more future draft picks and assets than any other team in the league.
Yet, here we are just one year later, watching the Thunder bow out in Game 7 of the Western Conference Finals at home to the Spurs, seeing their title defense come to an end without even making it back to the Finals.
If this sounds familiar, it’s because we’ve seen the 2024 champs, the Celtics, experience a similar fate. And the Nuggets before them, winning in 2023. And so on and so forth. The point being, things rarely stay the same in the NBA, and a lot of the time, the change happens much quicker than we expect.
All three of those teams seemed primed to run their conference and compete for championships for years, and now, all three are questioning their future after disappointing endings. The league is as competitive as ever, and teams are studying, copying, and learning to beat even the best of styles.
Celtics must be proactive instead of reactive
The Nuggets looked like they had solved the sport with their unstoppable Jokic-Murray two-man game, but the league figured it out. The Celtics looked like they had solved the sport with their spacing and three-point barrage, but the league figured it out. The Thunder looked like they had solved the sport with their SGA-led offense, swarming defense, and possession-maximizing, and sure enough, the league figured it out.
More than during any other era of the NBA, competitors are gunning for the top teams and working to neutralize any perceived advantages. Even the best teams have to adjust and stay on their toes to maintain success. What worked yesterday may not work today. We’re seeing it happen all across the league more than ever.
The Celtics need to realize this and work on building proactively instead of reactively. They don’t need to abandon all their principles or blow up the roster. In fact, far from it. But they do need to make some real changes to their schemes and philosophies, which will likely involve some tweaks to the roster.Â
I trust Brad Stevens, Joe Mazzulla, and the rest of the organization’s braintrust to figure it out, but they can’t just rely on what worked in the past and expect things to fall back into place with better health. They need to stay one step ahead and adapt and adjust to what has happened since they hung a banner in 2024.
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