Boston Celtics Doc Rivers admits he got the plan wrong against Philadelphia 76ers in game 2 – NBA News
The Boston Celtics lost the game 2 by a single point to the Philadelphia 76ers on Monday night, allowing the Sixers to tie the series at 1 game apiece.
The Celtics were controlled by the Sixers defense and got outrun by the young and athletic Sixers. Philadelphia led by double digits at halftime in both game 1 and 2. They had lost it owing to inexperience in the 2nd half of game 1, but held their nerves in the second one to chalk out a win.
The Celtics have started showing signs of fatigue after a rough regular season schedule, which has apparently pushed the veteran players to their limit. Now they are facing a young team, which is causing them trouble. However, Celtics coach has said in a radio interview that he might have made the wrong plays in game 2 and part of the blame rests on his shoulders too.
After scoring 29 points in game 1 against the Sixers, Celtics star forward Kevin Garnett was reduced to only 15 by the Sixers as he was not kept in the offensive circulation till late in the 2nd quarter. When asked about it, Rivers said:
“Maybe we weren’t a smart team last night or a well-coached team last night. It was obviously the game plan to go there. We were in transition a lot and never really got into our sets. That happens in games ... they were trapping early, which made us want to move the ball. But not move away from Kevin, and I thought that’s what we did. I thought we overreacted to their traps.”
When asked about the fact that Paul Pierce had scored only 7 points in the loss to the Sixers, going 2 of 9 from the field and suggesting his knee injury had something to do with his lackluster performance, Rivers said”
“He’s not hurting himself, I guess I’ll answer it that way. But he’s probably not healing either. Right now, we have a lot of guys that are banged up and we have to get through it. We didn’t play well last night and it had nothing to do with injuries.”
Whatever the reason, Rivers side doesn’t seem like one that had a turnaround in the regular season after the All Star Break and finished the season at 4th position in the Eastern Conference. Regular performers such as Pierce and Rondo are struggling and Boston does not have depth in its bench which means these key players will continue to play long minutes.
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