Nobody realizes the real reason the Celtics will be even better next season

It’s no secret that the Boston Celtics are one of the best teams in basketball. They just won a championship in dominant fashion, going 16-3 in the playoffs after a 64-18 regular season. But now, all eyes will be facing forward as they attempt to go back-to-back.

Brad Stevens brought back almost every player from last year’s roster, and all of the top guys in the rotation are under contract for multiple seasons. The Celtics have set themselves up for sustained success.

Jayson Tatum is a perennial All-NBA First-Teamer, Jaylen Brown is a perennial All-Star, and the rest of the top six is full of star-level talent playing smaller roles for the sake of team success.

The Celtics are keeping the same core for the first time in eight years, and consistency is the reason they will be even better next season

Add in Joe Mazzulla and the rest of the Celtics’ coaching staff, and there are plenty of explanations for people to believe they could repeat their same success—or even do better—next season. But none are the real reason.

The real reason the Celtics are going to be even better next season is because they have the same core running it back for the first time in nearly a decade.

Dating back to the Isaiah Thomas years, the Celtics have been switching up their top players year over year every single season. Whether it be because of injuries, trades, or free agency additions, Boston’s core has looked different every year.

Starting in the 2015-16 season, when Thomas was running the show, the Celtics immediately switched things up. They added Al Horford ahead of the 2016-17 season, bringing in a second All-Star to the mix.

Then, in 2017-18, the Celtics looked completely different. They traded for Kyrie Irving and signed Gordon Hayward, but Hayward was injured for the entire season, and Irving missed a ton of time, too. Jayson Tatum led the way in the playoffs.

When the 2018-19 season came around, Irving and Hayward were back in the fold, forcing the Celtics to adapt on the fly with a ton of personalities the team wasn’t used to.

Irving left that summer, and Kemba Walker came in, so the 2019-20 season meant another core chance. The change from 2019-20 to 2020-21 was the most minor of the bunch, but injuries and the pandemic meant there were a ton of different faces playing big minutes.

Horford was brought back into the fold ahead of the 2021-22 campaign, and Walker was moved. Once again, the Celtics were playing with a different core than the year prior. Plus, Ime Udoka replaced Brad Stevens as head coach.

The Celtics traded for Malcolm Brogdon ahead of the 2022-23 season, and Mazzulla replaced Udoka as head coach. Finally, the Jrue Holiday and Kristaps Porzingis trades of last summer brought the 2023-24 championship run to fruition.

Now, for the first time in eight years, the Celtics will get to simply run it back. Rather than adding new pieces into the fold, they will be able to build on the chemistry they built as a team the year prior.

Nothing breeds success better than consistency, and that’s exactly what the Celtics have heading into next year. That’s the real reason why they will be even better next season.