Down 2-0, the Celtics head to New York with extra questions than solutions

While in the midst of a collapse in December and January, wherein the Boston Celtics have misplaced nearly all of the video games they’ve received, they urged persistence.

This was solely the despair of an extended season. The postmates of a championship. A blip.

“I believe we’ll attain the height on the proper time,” stated Kristaps Porziņģis earlier than the Celtics closed their season by successful 19 of their final 22 video games, reassuring their uncertain on the truth that they know tips on how to flip it on when it issues.

But after the Celtics blew their second consecutive benefit of 20 factors on the New York Knicks to lose recreation 2 of their second spherical playoff collection on Wednesday 91-90, it’s time to surprise if the Celtics points had been extra pronounced than they presumed.

The collapse of the Celtics in Game 2 was not solely Deja Vu of Game 1, after they skipped a bonus of 20 factors to fall on the Knicks within the extraordinary, 108-105; It was symbolic of a much bigger downside.

The Celtics are experimenting with nice benefits and collapse in crunch-time conditions, an issue that will be comprehensible for a younger team-non a few famous person at Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown, who performed collectively for eight years, doing the playoffs in every seasons and successful the championship final 12 months.

Really, they had been repeated psychological drops, a major problem for a staff that is aware of that the margin of error within the put up -station is extremely scarce. Last post-installation, they by no means adopted a collection and by no means misplaced multiple recreation on a course for a successful race of title 16-3.

So why does it proceed to occur?

“I’m unsure,” stated Brown, who had 20 factors, six rebounds and 6 turnover. “We began in nice departures. We saved, we performed bodily, with vitality at this time. To begin the fourth quarter, I believed we had about 4 or 5 huge seems that didn’t enter, so perhaps this has struck us. But what was performed. Now we’ve the chance to see what we’re performed.”

The downside for the Celtics on this collection was the fourth quarter. In video games 1 and a couple of, they shot a 9 out of 45 (20 p.c) mixed by the sector and 4-per-24 (16.7) from past the arch within the final 12 minutes.

Wednesday, Brown went with out rating within the fourth quarter, whereas Tatum was 1 out of 5 from the sector.

In the meantime, the Knicks have seen that the Celtics hit a wall and capitalized on it. Mikal Bridges scored all 14 factors within the final quarter. He additionally made the theft of recreation in opposition to Tatum within the final seconds with the Knicks up, 91-90, stopping the Celtics from capturing a probably successful shot.

Jalen Brunson, who received the Clutch Player of the Year prize, confirmed why he deserved that honor, marking all six Knicks factors within the final 2 minutes.

Now, the Knicks are two wins away from their first look of the convention finals since 2000.

And the reigning champions are on the strings, setting a 0-2 gap with the three and 4 video games in New York.

Melissa Rohlin is on NBA Fox Sports author. Previously lined the championship for Sports Illustrated, the Los Angeles Times, the information group of the Bay Area and the San Antonio New Express. Follow it on Twitter @Melissarohl.

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