The Celtics鈥 victory yesterday was significant for a good many reasons, but two stand out. First, they鈥檝e proven that they can come out on top despite their failure to generate any consistent offense. Absent offensive stalwarts Kyrie Irving and Gordon Hayward, they often looked lost and out of their element producing points. It was certainly no coincidence that they hit just 42% of their field-goal attempts, and that the only two players on their roster to shoot better than 50% played the least in Game Five. Second, their inefficiency in canning baskets was more than offset by their tenacious effort at the other end of the court.
True, the Celtics under head coach Brad Stevens have been leeches in coverage. It鈥檚 why their net rating had hitherto been positive, and at times better, with Irving decommissioned. That said, they were especially tenacious yesterday, holding the Bucks to an atrocious 27.3% clip from downtown and 36.8% overall. And for all the otherworldly skills of Most Valuable Player candidate Giannis Antetokounmpo, he could not find any room to operate the way he did in Game Four. He managed to put up just 10 tries in 41 minutes of exposure, a horrifically anemic number given his importance to the cause.
After Hayward went down due to a freak injury early in his very first match for the Celtics, the prognosis for the league pioneers was unkind at best. And when Irving joined him in the sidelines, not a few pundits figured their season to be a lost cause. Given their heady stand so far against the Bucks, however, it has become clear that their capacity to play with house money cannot be questioned. And if they鈥檙e heading to the Bradley Center with a grand opportunity to close out their first-round set-to, it鈥檚 because they possess the confidence borne of their association with the sport鈥檚 greats.
Make no mistake. The Bucks are still alive, and can force a winner-take-all contest by holding down the fort in Game Six. To do so, however, they鈥檙e going to need to keep running their sets around Antetokounmpo anew; he鈥檚 too good to be used as merely a decoy. Conversely, he has to take it upon himself to be more aggressive. Stars avail of chances; unicorns create them. And if he鈥檚 the latter, then he should fulfill his mandate. At this point, there鈥檚 no other way for them to take the measure of the surging Celtics.
Anthony L. Cuaycong has been writing Courtside since 大象传媒 introduced a Sports section in 1994.
