BOSTON — There was hope that the Celtics have been going to take the subsequent step this yr after final season’s unimaginable run to the NBA Finals. But it surely’s off to a rocky begin earlier than the crew has even hit the ground.
The Celtics are just below a month away from taking part in an actual sport. The crew hasn’t even held its media day festivities forward of what was presupposed to be one other promising season. (That will likely be fairly the circus on Monday.) But right here we’re, in late September, already questioning how the crew goes to beat some large adversity.
We do not but understand how lengthy Boston will likely be with out head coach Ime Udoka, who’s going through what might be a prolonged suspension by the crew for reportedly having “an intimate and consensual relationship” with a feminine employees member. That goes in opposition to crew guidelines, and Udoka goes to be punished for it.
Whether or not it is 10 video games, half of a season, or the complete season — as has been reported as a powerful chance — this can be a large hit to the Boston Celtics. Not simply on the ground, however from a PR standpoint. It is a distraction that the crew actually should not need to take care of as they give the impression of being to take that subsequent leap.
Wyc Grousbeck pumping the brakes on the hype prepare surrounding the crew final week is seen in a complete totally different mild now. In a interval when the crew must be specializing in itself, it is now scrambling to save lots of face and discover a new — what we imagine is non permanent — chief on the bench.
Udoka’s high assistant from final yr, Will Hardy, has his personal gig in Utah. Joe Mazzulla, a 34-year-old Johnston, Rhode Island native who has been an assistant in Boston since 2019, has been reported because the likeliest candidate to take over.
This isn’t what we must be specializing in per week away from coaching camp.
Following the crew’s six-game loss to the Warriors within the Finals, the Celtics had seemingly completed all the things proper to come back again even stronger this yr. Brad Stevens bolstered the bench by including Malcolm Brogdon and Danilo Gallinari. The C’s even held all of it collectively — we predict — regardless of a rash of Kevin Durant commerce rumors.
Then Gallinari was misplaced for the yr. On Tuesday, it was introduced that Robert Williams will seemingly miss the beginning of the season as a result of he wants some extra surgical procedure on his knee.
The crew ought to have been capable of bounce again from each of these. Shedding its head coach is a complete totally different animal.
The Celtics overcame a great deal of adversity final season, thanks largely to Udoka’s management. That chief is now going through a season-long suspension for doing one thing he should not have been doing. It is put a extremely darkish cloud over the crew earlier than the season had an opportunity to even start.
