Turnovers are crushing the Celtics in the NBA Finals
BOSTON -- It seems like all postseason, we've been talking about what the Celtics could have done. They've missed several opportunities to either take control of a series or really put their opponent in a tough spot.
Instead, the Celtics have had a knack for wiggling themselves into those tough spots. Now they face the most daunting task of all: A 3-2 deficit in the NBA Finals.
And really, the Celtics have no one to blame but themselves. They have been beating themselves throughout the postseason, and the majority of it has to do with them giving the ball away.
We'll spare you from any bakery jokes, but the Celtics have been turning the ball over at an alarming pace this postseason. It's been frustrating and occasionally embarrassing to watch, whether it's Jayson Tatum throwing it away into traffic or Jaylen Brown dribbling off his leg for the umpteenth time in a game.
The Celtics are 1-7 this postseason when they commit 16 or more turnovers. They're 13-2 when they keep their turnovers under control.
After their 18-turnover showing in Game 5 of the Finals against the Warriors, the Celtics are now up to 314 turnovers this postseason, good for 13.65 turnovers per game. Tatum and Brown have accounted for 164 of those turnovers.
All of those turnovers have, obviously, led to disappointing results for Boston. The 18 turnovers on Monday night led to 22 Warriors points in a 104-94 defeat. The Celtics coughed it up 16 times in Game 4, giving the Warriors an opening to mount a fourth-quarter comeback. Somehow, neither of those games were as bad as Game 2, when the Celtics gave it up 19 times, leading to 33 Golden State points. The Warriors won in blowout fashion.
"Playing in the crowd too much has caused a lot of these turnovers," head coach Ime Udoka said after Game 5. "When we're at our best, it's simple ball movement."
That simple ball movement has gone missing over the last five quarters of the NBA Finals, and the Celtics are now on the brink of elimination. This issue has plagued them all postseason, with the Celtics averaging 16.8 turnovers -- leading to 22.4 points for their opponents -- in Boston's nine losses.
The Celtics are averaging just 11.9 turnovers in their 14 victories.
"We got to be better," Tatum said after Game 5. "We're hard to beat when we don't turn the ball over. Clearly, we're easy to beat when we do turn the ball over."
Tatum had four more turnovers on Monday night, and now owns the NBA record for the most turnovers in a single postseason with 95.
The turnovers happen at just about every juncture of the game. On Monday night, Tatum turned it over on Boston's first possession. The Celtics had nine turnovers by halftime, and the Warriors turned them into 13 points to take a 12-point lead into the break. The Celtics committed four turnovers in each of the third and fourth quarter, with those four in the fourth matching the amount of shots the team made from the floor in the frame.
That is no way to win a basketball game, let alone a title. The Warriors don't need any help with extra possessions, but the Celtics have been giving them plenty this series.
Is there some magic potion to make this go away?
"Just some patience, a little bit more perseverance," Brown said Monday night. "We didn't have that [in Game 5]. But we're going to need to have it for next game."
The turnovers are just part of the problem for the Celtics in the Finals, but they are the root of the team's issues. Tatum has been struggling with his shot and has been missing a boatload of looks at the rim, so he's been forcing a lot of his passes. Brown keeps committing unforced errors because he looks like a baby giraffe trying to dribble the ball. And though he can thread the needle on most occasions, Smart has been getting too fancy at times.
The last two games have essentially been two epic turnovers for the Celtics, because they basically gave both of those games away because of their miscues. It's been a game-to-game theme, and if the Celtics don't clean it up, it will cost them their best chance at winning a title with this core group.