Marcus Smart scanned the postgame press convention and, with a slight nod, took inventory of the assembled media.
“A lot of people, I’m sure a lot of you guys in here, counted us out early on in the season. For us, we’ll take it,” the Celtics guard stated, now with a summer time of soul-searching like few others forward of him.
Hard to argue, after all. Back on Jan. 6, that notorious date when the Celtics blew a 29-point lead in New York and fell three video games underneath .500 at 18-21 for the final time of the season, it was laborious to think about them as something greater than a play-in staff.
So Smart was proper after Thursday night time’s Game 6 elimination by Golden State within the first NBA Finals look by a Celtics staff since 2010. As a lot as they made believers of the league during the last 67 video games, together with 24 grinding playoff video games, they very a lot received there on the ability of self-belief, and the religion of only a few others.
“I mean, I think for us, myself, it’s just everything that we have accomplished, everything we had to go through to even get to this situation,” stated Smart. “Nobody even had us being right here, not to mention within the playoffs.
“It definitely is tough. But it’s definitely one of those things we’ve been through hell to get here, and you take that,” he stated. “You know what I’m saying? We got to use that. It’s going to be tough. That’s what I know for myself (how) I’m viewing it and looking at all the (bleep) we had to get through to get here just to even get to this situation to have an opportunity. Proud of this team. Obviously we didn’t accomplish our goal.”
That’s as a result of a superior staff received in the way in which. Golden State, along with proving they may win all of it within the post-Kevin Durant period, reinstated their place on the prime of the NBA after two seasons of injurious battle. They have received 4 titles within the final eight seasons, made six Finals appearances in that span, and have a consistency and maturity that the Celtics have been discovered missing on the NBA’s final stage.
But Grant Williams, who like a lot of his teammates wilted underneath this highlight when tasked with executing like a mature staff, doesn’t assume the hole between the Celtics and Warriors is all that broad.
“I don’t think it’s that big of a gap, honestly,” he stated. “I feel as a lot as I’m bringing it up, I really feel prefer it’s a fast repair. Some guys it takes an offseason to reply the way in which they did. You look again to groups over the previous years, superstars included and non-superstars included, you undergo one thing like this.
“It’s our first time experiencing it,” he stated. “And it either changes you for the better or changes you for the worse. I think each guy in this locker room is going to change for the better for their approach, and it’s going to be a whole different team and a whole different approach next season. By the start of it, everybody is going to come back with a different mentality and a different hunger, and if they don’t we’re going to bring it out of them, because we’re not going to go for it next year.”
Williams, like nearly all of his teammates – most notably Jayson Tatum – suffered by a critical offensive drain towards the Warriors’ complete and disciplined defensive schemes. Though Tatum set the NBA document (100) for turnovers by a participant in a single postseason – an inventory is populated by Hall of Famers like Larry Bird and LeBron James – the problem was a staff drawback.
But Williams feels he can study rather a lot from the participant he wasn’t solely matched up towards, however somebody he has modeled his personal recreation after – Draymond Green.
They had an on-court dialog Thursday night time following the sport.
“As I’ve always said, Draymond’s the guy that I always idolized growing up, and he’s the ultimate competitor. And it’s one of those things showing the respect that was deserved,” Williams stated. “As much as trash talk, or as much as we go at it, at the end of the day, we leave it on the court. And that’s exactly how I think both of us are and both of us play. So it was a little bit of just congratulations from my end, and him instilling that word of wisdom for the future. And you always gotta respect a man like that. He’s a phenomenal, phenomenal guy. And for us, it’s just a matter of, he basically just said, You’ll be back when you get back, don’t allow the opportunity to slip again and just continue to improve. It’s not necessarily in those words, but that’s kind of the message I received from him.”
Green’s message was much like the one acknowledged by Ime Udoka following the final recreation of a wild season – come again higher subsequent fall.
“The leadership side of things, how to be better for the guys down the line,” Williams stated of his interpretation of the Celtics coach’s message. “And then individually, just improving so that things like that won’t happen again. Going in, seeing that last night, you want to congratulate the other team. It was a long, hard fought season, but for both sides. But it shows, for me, how bright a future this team has. It instills confidence in me and all of my brothers, I feel like. And at the end of the day, it’s one of those things where you have to respond now. How do you approach this next coming season? And that’s kind of how I’ve approached it. And seeing exactly the celebratory, seeing how huge of a moment that is for anybody, or any player, no matter if you played or didn’t play. It just makes you even more hungry to come back. And I know that for me, I just want to be there again and be able to have that same same opportunity to compete at a high level like that again.”
Source: www.bostonherald.com