Survival Mode

The Celtics didn't play their best games Friday in Toronto or tonight in Memphis. But the NBA season isn't about playing your best every game. It's about surviving the nights when "best" is just not possible. That's what the Celtics did in these two games. One stretch in the third quarter tonight was emblematic.

With 7:10 left in the third quarter tonight in Memphis, the Grizzlies' John Konchar put in a layup to pull the score to 67-64, and Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla called a time out. When the game resumed, he had taken out Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown, and Jrue Holiday, and inserted Al Horford, Sam Hauser, and Payton Pritchard to play alongside starters Kristaps Porzingis and Derrick White. Tatum and Holiday often come out early in the first and third quarters, but subbing out Brown at this point was unusual. A couple of minutes later, Porzingis came out with his fourth foul, and Neemias Queta made his season and Celtics debut (congrats to him!!!). The four bench players rolled with White the final five minutes of the quarter. It was, I believe, the first time all season that all of Tatum, Brown, Holiday, and Porzingis were all on the bench simultaneously outside of garbage time. At the end of the quarter, the Celtics had the same three-point lead that they had at the start of the half. They had survived.

Had the tactic backfired and the Celtics lost the game, a lot of attention would likely be paid to this five-minute stretch. Instead, the Celtics banked five minutes of rest for those four starters, and for the game, no one on the C's played more than Holiday's 36:46 minutes. Now they'll roll into Charlotte tomorrow relatively fresh, which is important. Charlotte was resting tonight, and they've been home for a full week. They'll be ready to get out and run tomorrow, and the C's will have to match their intensity. They'll have to survive.

This is a particularly grueling stretch part of the schedule. The C's haven't had consecutive off-days since Nov. 2-3, and counting tonight's game, they will play five games in eight days. Tomorrow's game is not against a quality opponent, but it is the fourth game of a four-game road trip. It is the first of four road trips this season that last either four or five games, and at the end of a road trip like this, you leave yourself open to blows from the randomness hammer. Tonight brought a one-two punch of Santi Aldama's fifth-ever 20-point game (one of the other four was also against the C's). Tonight was his 116th career game, so you can't exactly say that the C's should have been ready for that, even given Memphis' injuries. The other punch was the refs that seemed to have a score to settle with the C's, as they called them for eight offensive fouls, many of which were 50-50 calls.

The Celtics could very easily be 9-4 right now, but they're 11-2, because they bent but didn't break. It's a great start, but last year's team started 13-3 and 22-5 before struggling mightily down the stretch. The same fate could be waiting for them this year. The Celtics will play 15 of their first 20 games after the All-Star break on the road, a brutal stretch that includes both a five- and six-game road trip. So banking these wins now is super important, and as such, it's really great to see this team be able to win in survival mode.

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

I've not been as prolific this month as I'd like, but it's the most wonderful time of the year, and as someone who owns a store that does a very large percentage of its revenue in the fourth quarter of the year, real life simply does intervene. But trust that I've got a whole bunch of ideas written down for when my real work schedule loosens up. In the meantime, stop by and say hi, and maybe take a look at some books. :-)

Go C's.