But that would never have been the plan if the coach could have helped. After all, Mazulla is one of the most competitive people in the sport, and that's saying something. He accepts suffering. He starts each day with an ice bath and ends it in his chapel. He walked barefoot through the jungle of Costa Rica. After winning the championship last year, he told reporters: “People will say the target is on our back, but I hope it's right on our forehead, between our eyes.” During training camp last fall, at the annual media game, he had the media play a prank on the coaching staff and then assigned those coaches, who included former Division I NBA and NCAA players, to orchestrate a full-court defensive pressure. The coaches won 57–4. (The game lasted only twelve minutes.) Mazulla clenched his fists after the final ball. That man? Tank? We all should have known.
The Celtics started the season 0-3 and then struggled to 5-7, which was more or less what many people expected. They won some quality games, lost some games they could have won, hit a lot of 3-pointers and couldn't come back to save their lives. Brown was excellent, but White and Pritchard, the other main players in the championship team, fought poorly, sometimes pressing and panicking as time expired and shots missed.
The turnaround came suddenly: After a tough two-game loss to the Philadelphia 76ers, the Celtics crushed the Memphis Grizzlies the next night, 131–95. And within two weeks of that, they had the No. 1 offense in the league. What's happened?
The simplest answer concerns Brown. Most of the attacks were also focused on him and he was impressive. Good players can compensate for many of the shortcomings of the entire team. Brown is constantly attacking and clearly assessing the situation; he now runs pick-and-rolls with ease. His main job is to score, and he does it from everywhere, including taking deeper two-point shots than anyone else, shots that have fallen out of fashion recently due to their analytical profile (almost as hard to hit as three-pointers, but worth fifty percent fewer points). They work for him—and for the team—opening up lanes, making defenders hesitate. He averages about thirty points a night and is not only more involved with the ball, but also a more efficient scorer, a rare combination.
Another answer is that White and Pritchard are good players, and even good players have cold streaks; eventually the cold streaks end. The Celtics' fortunes changed when the two regained their form. Another response highlights the adaptability of the team: many players are getting minutes, and all of them find those minutes valuable. Talent wins in the NBA, but strong execution of fundamentals can go a long way toward disrupting the established order. (Then the Oklahoma City Thunder, who have only one loss so far this season, are special in their own right.) Brown has perfect footwork. Keta is a wall. Everyone is installing screens and cutting hard. The team watched a lot of film to solve the rebounding problem and increased its effort: being smaller, the coaches emphasized, helps you hit first and hit hard.
This could describe the team's overall approach. Last season and for some time before that, the Celtics went through a sort of algorithmic process to the top that involved a lot of 3-point shooting—so many 3-pointers that the strategy became known as Mazzulla Ball. And the players making those shots, especially the seven-foot-two Tatum and Porzingis, were so smooth that the style of play could seem a little bloodless. This is no longer the case. Framing now seems less actuarial and more psychologically motivated. The Celtics still lead the league in three-point shooting, but they don't play the kind of seamless, positionless basketball that modern teams prefer. It seems like every player has something to prove and everyone knows their job. The basic instructions are clear enough: never turn the ball over; rush to collect missed throws; knock their balls out; accept open views. Do absolutely everything you can to help the team score.
Can the team's success last? Maybe not. On Thursday, playing the Milwaukee Bucks, who were in free fall and without their star Giannis Antetokounmpo, the Celtics built an early lead. Walsh made all seven of his shots in the first half, scoring eighteen points, three rebounds and three steals. Then, in the second half, the Celtics gave up a goal. It was like a farce as ball after ball was lifted up, over and over again, banged on the hoop or missed altogether. Collectively, the team missed sixteen three-point attempts in a row.
