FanPost

Not Dead Yet

Have you ever seen Monty Python's Search for the Holy Grail? In it there's a scene, which takes place during The Plague, where there's some sort of undertaker pulling a cart loaded with dead people, ringing a bell and saying "Bring out yer dead." A peasant, played by John Cleese, tries to load an old (presumably) dead guy onto the cart, but runs into problems when the old man isn't dead yet.

This scene from the Holy Grail reminds me so much of what has happened in this C's vs. Bulls series to date. The Celtics dropped 2 ugly home games to the Bulls. Game 2 was particularly ugly and frustrating. But the eulogy that was being written when the Celtics were down 0-2 was entirely premature. In fact, I was beginning to wonder if the Celtics' eventual comeback in this series was entering into reverse lock territory*. When people like Tony Massarotti, who know nothing about basketball, are saying the series is over, you know there's a good chance of a Celtic's comeback.

The Celtics struggling against the Bulls shouldn't have been a total shock. While a #1 seed rarely if ever drops the first 2 games to the #8 seed in a playoff series, there was much talk about the Celtics' legitimacy as a #1 seed leading up to the playoffs. There was discussion about whether or not the Celtics were the worst #1 seed in NBA history. I have heard so many times over the last 2 weeks the notion that Jimmy Butler is the best player in this series. The Celtics are still incredibly young and that doesn't help in the playoffs. With extra rest between games, aging players like Rondo and Wade are able to take their games to another level. So this situation the C's find themselves in should not come as a total shock. However, the manner in which it was happening was extremely frustrating.

But with all the talk around the Celtics and their 0-2 hole to the Bulls, you would have thought the series was over. The way Celtics fans and media pundits were acting, it was almost as if the rules had changed and I didn't find out about it. Were the Celtics playing a best of 5 series in round1?

The premature talk about the Celtics' season ending was particularly surprising given recent sports history. There have been countless examples of teams coming from behind in a series. There were the 2016 Cavs rallying from down 3-1 to the Warriors, the 2004 Red Sox coming back from a 3-0 en route to breaking the curse as examples. The Bruins were on the wrong end of a comeback in 2010, choking away a 3-0 lead against the Flyers. The 2004 Red Sox showed that it just takes one spark (a Dave Roberts steal and Mariano Rivera blown save) to shift the momentum of a series. The Rondo injury could have been that spark. As C's fans we got very frustrated over the first 2 games. Imagine how Bulls fans are feeling right now? I'm thinking that they might not be that confident. Surprising things happen in sports all the time. I don't know about you, but that's a big part of why I watch.

Celtics fans have loved the team's progress over the last few years. But now is the time for the first playoff series victory under Brad Stevens. Detractors are all too quick to point to a lack of playoff success from this current C's core. 2015 was understandable, they shouldn't have made the playoffs that year, but they got IT at the deadline and got the #8 seed in an awful Eastern Conference. In 2016 they looked primed for home court advantage and stumbled down the stretch ending up in a 3 way tie and the #5 seed. Playoff injuries affected a team that already wasn't that deep last season. In these playoffs though, the Celtics were the #1 seed and they finally acted like it in Game 3. If there were a team to get on a sudden roll it would be this team. They're a bit streaky. They just needed to get that first W on the board. Still, they're down in the series. They had far from an ideal start. But, this isn't March Madness. Shocking upsets are not that common in the NBA playoffs because they play a 7 game series.

The Celtics have shown that they're not dead yet. But work remains from the hole they put themselves in. They need to prevent Chicago from getting any momentum and confidence in the series. Can't let the Bulls get that spark that shifts the momentum back. The Bulls came out on fire against the Celtics. The C's answered with their own counterpunch. We'll see if an undermanned 8 seed in the Bulls can answer that call.

*reverse lock: (credit to Bill Simmons) when pretty much everyone agrees on an outcome you should be thinking that rarely if ever do things happen exactly as expected (if they did, we'd all be sportsbook millionaires) and think about going in the other direction. Or put more simply, when something is too obvious to be true.

FanPosts are fan-created content and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of CelticsBlog. Be respectful and keep it clean. Thanks.