Knicks 91, Celtics 90

 

Are you fucking kidding me? The Celtics blow a second-half 20-point lead for the second game in a row? How is that even possible?

But that's exactly what happened. Until Tatum hit a pair of free throws with 45 seconds left to play, the Celtics hadn't scored a point in the last 4½ minutes of the game while New York was going on a 12-0 run. Tatum scored a dunk with 18 seconds left to give the Celtics a one-point lead, but Jalen Brunson of the Knicks sunk a pair of free throws and then Mikal Bridges stole the ball from Tatum to end the game.

The Celtics are down 0-2 and head to NYC and MSG to face a confident Knicks team for Game Three on Friday night.

It's been a weird playoff season. Cleveland, which lead the East all season, has fallen 0-2 to the fourth-seeded Indiana Pacers. In the West, No. 1 seed Oklahoma City is 0-1 against the Denver Nuggets, and the second-seeded Houston Rockets and third-seeded LA Lakers didn't even make it to the Conference Semifinals. It's not impossible that the Finals might be the unlikely pairing of the Indiana Pacers versus the Minnesota Timberwolves.

But that's not an excuse for Boston's poor performance these past two games. Al Horford started at center with Porzingis coming off the bench, but Horford scored only four points all game while Porzingis got only eight. Tatum only scored 13, and while he did get 14 rebounds, I'm not going to praise his double double when Karl-Anthony Towns had a double d going by halftime.

The Celtics looked tired and unmotivated, chucking up and missing futile threes instead of hustling and driving into the paint. They attempted 40 threes and only sunk 10 of them. They looked like a team that didn't believe they'll see, much less win, the Finals, and at this point, I'm not convinced either.