Tempers and Uncertainty Rose as Celtics Embraced In Season Tournament

BOSTON — Joe Mazzulla arrived at the podium with the Celtics needing a Nets victory to secure a berth in the In-Season Tournament. Brooklyn, in play as well with a large enough win, battled Toronto within a possession for nearly the entirety of their game until Mikal Bridges and Royce O’Neale hit threes to extend the Nets’ lead to multiple possessions. The Raptors missed their next seven shots, Cam Johnson hit four free throws and O’Neale buried another triple as Brooklyn narrowed the point differential with Boston.

They ran out of time and OG Anunoby slammed the door with a three while Mazzulla concluded his presser. He didn’t have the score in front of him.

“Without worrying about it, we advanced,” Mazzulla said. “Think about what the process does. Process over results.”

Mazzulla began the night saying he felt no obligation to effectively cover the 23-point spread needed for the Celtics to advance, potentially more if Brooklyn lost and Orlando won Group C head-to-head over Boston. Like in their loss to the Magic on Friday, when Mazzulla pulled starters late and the Celtics’ players let Orlando expand their point differential, the Celtics sounded comfortable punting on the tournament and taking a routine win over a flailing Chicago team. Instead Boston wanted to focus on improving their recent play before an assistant coach told Mazzulla that Brooklyn led in the fourth quarter. The scoreboard showed the same update to the team.

The Celtics had already built a 31-point lead with 7:34 remaining. Coaches and players agreed — go for it. Jrue Holiday, Jaylen Brown and Al Horford subbed in to close the game that the Celtics won by 27, clinching a Monday quarterfinal appearance at the Pacers for a trip to Las Vegas.

“We didn’t know we were gonna be in that position to win the game,” Mazzulla said. “When we got to that point, I felt like it was time to execute and put ourself in position to advance … going into a game, you can’t think those things. You do have to be prepared for them, and once you’re in that situation, you have to be ready to go to it.”

“I took in all the information, I didn’t handle it emotionally and I sat and stored it in whatever part of my brain that stores information, and I waited to see if I was going to need it or not. I don’t know going into a game that we’re gonna be up 23, we could be down 15 because that’s a distraction, because we’re trying to be up 23, and you’re gonna be like, was your team distracted by the 23-point lead? … our team was focused on winning.”

Boston didn’t discuss in-season scenarios, as they hadn’t throughout their four-game slate, though Derrick White acknowledged players generally knew the gist of what needed to happen on Tuesday. Bulls head coach Billy Donovan did too, already witnessing a spat between Chicago and the Raptors over Toronto’s handling of the fourth quarter in pursuit of a point differential advantage. Five eastern teams, including the Celtics, Nets and Magic in the same group, finished 3-1, setting up complicated, evolving point differential tiebreakers that Boston needed to manage. Donovan had understood the Celtics might try to run up the score.

He didn’t expect Mazzulla to intentionally foul Andre Drummond, who entered the game with a 64.3% success rate at the line. Drummond missed four straight free throws while Horford scored five in the opposite direction, building a 116-81 advantage following a Holiday three. Moments earlier, Brooklyn and Toronto stood tied at 80, the Celtics pulled within six points of the Knicks’ differential in the wild card race. Coby White kept Chicago within 30 against the Boston bench. That’s when Mazzulla turned his head toward his bench and decided a plan.

“Once it got to that and you started playing the math game, and your possessions are 0.0 points per possession because they missed two free throws, that gets me excited,” Mazzulla said. “It’s not that I don’t think the In Season Tournament is fun or it’s important, but there’s a process. You go back to the Orlando game, are we gonna rebound just because it’s an (IST) game? I don’t want our guys to have that type of mindset … we have to rebound every game … it’s because of habits and mindset, and we have to keep those things going … when the process brings you to, ok, you’re at 30, what’d you want to do? I want to get stops … and I apologized to Andre Drummond for doing that, but it gave us the best chance considering the circumstances we were in.”

Donovan didn’t like the position Mazzulla put Drummond in, who politely declined to comment on the situation in Chicago’s locker room. Drummond said he’d talk about basketball, clearly not considering what happened in that circumstance to be part of the NBA game. Donovan approached Mazzulla on the sideline when Boston began fouling, and Mazzulla explained that the Celtics wanted to protect their lead with Brooklyn ahead. It appeared tense, and they talked again in the hallway after the game before Mazzulla asked Bulls representatives to talk to Drummond. Brown and Holiday later said they didn’t enjoy running up the score on Chicago.

It’s not how you play, they said. That made it all the more interesting. One reporter compared it to the entire arena watching a team try to cover a point spread. It created a unique environment beyond the court, uniforms and games that became difficult to differentiate from other regular season games. Who cares? Many readers asked to end last week. How’d the Celtics get in? they asked to begin this one.

The players seemed more intrigued too Horford reminisced on how it reminded him of his FIBA competitions with the Dominican Republic. Fans stayed in the stands to watch the Celtics play first half intensity in a game that otherwise would’ve sent them to the exits for an early bedtime on a Tuesday night. Post-game coverage would’ve involved little more than analyzing Holiday’s solid return from an ankle sprain and another Horford spot start.

All that’s important and Mazzulla tried to keep the focus on Boston’s rebounding, defense and attention to detail entering the game. They accomplished both, executing seamlessly while clearly shooting for the tournament berth. Sam Hauser ran full speed toward Tatum’s fourth quarter miss and threw down a put-back dunk that sent the Garden into a frenzy, Boston ahead by 29 as the Nets started their fourth quarter up by a point.

The Knicks’ lead mounted to 20, sinking the Celtics’ wild card hopes. The Heat’s scoring margin soon controlled seeding, losing by seven to boost Milwaukee ahead of Indiana. Other games and scores lined computers and phones like the last day of the regular season as the Celtics tried to hold up their end of the bargain. Another Horford three built a 33-point advantage that Chicago dug into with seven straight points. Brown responded by diving to the floor to grab Tatum’s missed three in a 121-95 game with 2:27 remaining. In came the bench.

“We did the best we could at trying to build it … I saw enough,” Mazzulla said. “We don’t need people getting hurt.”