The Boston Celtics beat the Dallas Mavericks 106-99 on Wednesday at American Airlines Center to take a commanding 3-0 lead in the NBA Finals. The Mavericks made a furious comeback in the fourth quarter, but fell short after star Luka Doncic fouled out on a couple questionable calls that he really did not agree with.
The home crowd was understandably dead as the Celtics pulled away in the third quarter, which is when the Mavericks X account tweeted one of the saddest things you’ll ever see. The X equivalent of “please clap.”
This near the end of the third as the Celtics lead ballooned and Jaylen Brown prepared to put a stamp on a 35-19 quarter with a thunderous dunk that took them to the fourth with a 15-point lead. Meanwhile, back on the Internet, the team’s post was getting roasted.
The funny thing is, it must have worked. During the break between quarters and the Celtics extending their lead to 21 fans must have had time to check their phones and get the message. What else could explain the team’s 22-2 run?
Sure, they ultimately came up short, but what a social media effort. If there’s ever been a case for posting through it, this is it.
The Boston Celtics had a little scare in Game 3 of the NBA Finals. After a Derrick White three-pointer put Boston up 91-70 with 11:07 remaining in the fourth quarter the Dallas Mavericks went on a 22-2 run to make it a one-point game with 3:37 left in regulation. It must have felt like watching a train crash in slow motion for everyone in Boston, but according to White, there's one person might have enjoyed it: head coach Joe Mazzulla.
White, who had 16 points, five rebounds, four assists and two blocked shots, talked to the press after the game and was asked about how Mazzulla acted down the stretch as the lead disappeared. As Mazzulla said before the game, “The closer you think you are to beating someone, the closer you are to getting your ass kicked." White confirmed that Mazzulla probably enjoyed it because it would allow him to keep telling the team that they have to stay focused.
"He's a sicko, so probably." 😅 🤣
Derrick White on whether or not Joe Mazzulla enjoyed the chance to rally back after a blown lead pic.twitter.com/7yBEcRdvDT
— Celtics on NBC Sports Boston (@NBCSCeltics) June 13, 2024
"Yeah, Joe is consistent the whole time," said White. " And I mean, he's probably so happy that it happened like that so he can just continue to tell us that. He just stays consistent. He just makes the right calls and we trust him completely. Yeah. Seemed pretty true today."
Asked a followup about whether Mazzulla was really enjoying it White said, "He's a sicko, so probably."
The ultimate compliment for any coach. With a 3-0 lead in the Finals, Mazzulla currently has a 121-43 record in the regular season and won 26 of the first 37 postseason games he's coached. Whatever he's saying or doing, it seems to be working. No matter how sick in the head he may seem.
Last week, as thousands of green-clad fans spilled out of TD Garden and onto nearby Causeway St. still buzzing—and for many, still buzzed—from Boston’s Game 2 win over Indiana, an unmistakable chant filled the warm spring air.
We want Kyrie …
We want Kyrie …
It will be Dallas vs. Boston in the NBA Finals. It’s also Boston vs. Kyrie. Five years after Kyrie Irving’s abrupt exit, public (basketball) enemy No. 1 is back in town. They have met in the playoffs before, with Irving’s Nets wiping the floor with a battered Boston team in 2021 and the Celtics sweeping Brooklyn in ‘22.
A trip to the second round was at stake in those series.
Said Irving, “Boston is in the way between our goal.”
In Boston, the disdain for Irving runs deep. He’s Ulf Samuelsson in high tops. Roger Goodell in gym shorts. The most disliked NBA player since Bill Laimbeer. What Reggie Miller is to New York, Irving is to Boston. The only difference is Miller never wore a Knicks uniform. On eBay, you can still buy Irving jerseys in Celtics green.
Time heals most wounds. Not these. These have barely scabbed over. Irving has not exactly attempted to ease the tension. In 2021, before Irving returned to Boston for a first-round playoff series with Brooklyn, he said he hoped not to hear any “subtle racism.” After beating the Celtics in Game 4, Irving walked to center court and stomped on the logo.
There will inevitably be attempts to rewrite history in the days ahead. Irving didn’t hate Boston. He just wanted to go home to New York. He didn’t have bad relationships with his teammates. That’s media stuff, reporters chasing clicks. He didn’t bail out on his team late in the 2018-19 season. Those Celtics just didn’t have enough.
Nonsense. He wasn’t on the same page as Brad Stevens. He didn’t have much of a relationship with Jaylen Brown. Quit is probably too strong of a word but talk to enough people around that 2018-19 team and it’s clear there’s a belief that late in the season, Irving checked out. In the fall of ’18, Irving grabbed a mic and told a giddy Garden crowd he intended to re-sign there. By the spring, he was gone.
On Sunday, Irving talked about how he better understands leadership. In Boston, he struggled with it. Irving was the only member of the Celtics core with a championship, a status he was known to wield like a cudgel. He knew what it took to win—and he had the ring to prove it. During one locker room discussion, sources told SI, it was pointed out that Al Horford won two championships at Florida. Not the same, Irving said. A Boston assistant was part of a championship staff in Europe. Not the same, he replied. Aron Baynes, a reserve center on the Celtics 2018-19 team who won a title with San Antonio, wasn’t in the room for the exchange. At least one ex-teammate wonders what Irving would have said if he was.
Things never fully clicked for Irving (11) in Boston. / Jeremy Brevard-USA TODAY Sports
In Dallas, things are different. Throughout the organization, respect for Irving runs deep. He has been an extension of Jason Kidd on the floor. He has been a calming influence off of it. He has figured out how to succeed opposite Luka Dončić, creating an all-time great duo in the process. When Irving returned from a leg injury in January, team officials marveled at the effort Irving was putting in on the defensive end of the floor.
Asked about the skepticism of Irving’s fit in Dallas, Kidd said, “It’s alright to be wrong.”
Some of it is Irving, at 32, facing reality. He has played on three teams in the last six seasons. Four in the last eight. Cleveland, Boston, Brooklyn—Vesuvius left less wreckage. When Irving hit free agency last summer, Dallas was the only team offering real money to sign him.
Some of it is Dallas. The warm Texas climate and its right leaning politics. “He still will have his opinions of what he thinks,” said Kidd. “And here with the Mavs, we support that.” In Kidd, Irving has found a peer. Irving grew up watching Kidd in New Jersey. When Irving was in high school, they connected at a Nike event. “He was pretty good,” said Kidd. Inside the Dallas locker room, the bond between Irving and Kidd is ironclad.
“Just being able to talk the truth or speak the truth to one another,” said Kidd. “I compliment him for trusting me. I'm only here to tell him the truth and to try to help him achieve his goals.”
Kidd knows what it’s like to be a villain in Boston, his Nets years filled with fierce Celtics battles. Kidd was fueled by the hate. At times, Irving has seemed rattled by it. Irving has faced the Celtics 10 times since the 2021 playoffs. He has lost each one. He has had several dustups with fans, admitting in ‘22 that the crass attacks were “about so much you can take as a competitor.” It was bad then. It will be worse now.
“I’m at a place in my life where I don’t consider those past moments,” Irving told ESPN. “I was able to unpack them in a healthy way [and] move forward as a person. I had a rough time there when I was in Boston, dealing with a death in my family and a lot of off-court stuff that I wasn’t ready to handle. Now that I’m in a great place to be able to vocalize how I’m feeling, I’m ready to go back into Boston and have fun with my teammates.”
Fun? That’s up to Irving. Dallas needs a poised Irving. A composed one. This will be a difficult series. The Celtics are 2–0 against the Mavericks this season. They beat them by nine before the trades that brought P.J. Washington and Daniel Gafford to Dallas. They beat them by 28 after. They have elite defenders, dynamic wing scorers and will likely have a healthy Kristaps Porziņģis when the series begins next week.
“They have a lot of talented players,” said Kidd. “They've been [to the Finals] before. They have the experience, they're well coached. This is another great test.”
They need Irving. Dončić will get his points. The All-NBA guard is enjoying one of the finest stretches of his career. But he will need help. He will need Irving to be the shot maker he was in the conference finals, where he averaged 27 points—including 36 in Game 5—on 49% shooting. The three-point shooter (42.3%) he has been in the playoffs. The All-Star-level sidekick he has been all season.
Irving is coming to Boston, and make no mistake: a hyped up Boston crowd will be waiting. The boos will be loud, the rhetoric nasty. It will be the most intense environment Irving has played in and this time, everything is at stake. A championship is within reach for Kyrie Irving. It’s the Celtics, it’s Boston standing in front of it.
The reunion between Kyrie Irving and the Boston Celtics won't be the only meeting of a player with their former team during the 2024 NBA Finals. Kristaps Porzingis will also be up against his old squad, having played for the Dallas Mavericks back from 2019 to '21.
On Monday, Fanduel's Chandler Parsons suggested there was some bad blood between Porzingis and Luka Dončić stemming from their time as a tandem in Dallas.
Dončić addressed the claims from Parsons on Tuesday, indicating he and Porzingis have a good relationship, despite their on-court efforts not yielding much success, and added that he's scarcely ever even spoken to Parsons.
"I've talked to Chandler Parsons maybe twice in my life, so I don't know how he would know... But me and KP have a good relationship," said Dončić, via Joey Mistretta of ClutchPoints.
Chandler Parsons previously said that Luka Doncic and Kristaps Porzingis don’t have a good relationship.
Porzingis joined the Mavs and was paired alongside Dončić with the goal of making an elite offensive tandem. Expectations were not quite met, however, and the plug was pulled on the experiment after a little more than two seasons.
They've both since gone on to find success, with Porzingis playing a vital role for the Celtics as they earned the league's best record in the regular season and Dončić emerging as arguably the sport's best player and leading his Mavericks to their first NBA Finals appearance since 2011.
Porzingis was also asked about the situation with Dončić in Dallas, though he didn't want to spend too much time on the topic.
"It didn't work out. I think it was–yeah. I don't know, I'm not even thinking about that right now. I'm focused on the job ahead. We can talk about that later," said Porzingis, via Noa Dalzell of SB Nation.
Kristaps Porzingis didn't want to get into the weeds of his relationship with Luka / his Mavericks tenure today:
"It didn't work out. I think it was - yeah. I don't know, I'm not even thinking about that right now. I'm focused on the job ahead. We can talk about that later." pic.twitter.com/GU2S0vrVAs
