Stevens: “I just want us to have a joyful period”

The Celtics are ending the first week in the Disney World bubble on a high as they look to regain the focus they had before the season abruptly paused. At the conclusion of the week, Brad Wanamaker opened up about the first week inside the Celtics mini-training camp.

Brad Wanamaker said via Zoom, “it’s like night and day comparing where the team was five days ago to where it is now.” Wanamaker said the team had started to go at one another harder as the week rolled on and as the rust starts to disappear after a four month layoff.

Talking about dealing with the downtime, Brad’s echoed the thoughts of other players experiences in Orlando. He said he spent the long periods of downtime just “relaxing in my room, playing video games, talking to my family.” With golf and visiting the pool the only really escapism in Disney World, many players including Brad Wanamaker, Vincent Poirier, and the rest of the rookies have taken to riding bikes and exploring with Tacko Fall leading the bike squadron.

The bubble has already been an emotional experience for all the players and the coaching staff with the departure of first-year assistant coach, Kara Lawson, earlier in the week. Lawson won the top job at Duke as the new women’s head coach. In the midst of the news the team showed support to Lawson in a moving gesture, wearing Duke T-shirts in her honor.

Brad Stevens said via Zoom with Celtics.com that Kara Lawson’s “a terrific person, a terrific coach, she’ll be a great fit at Duke.” As a personal coach of Marcus Smart, the veteran said of Lawson that “our bond is strong” and a person Smart considers as someone, “more than my shooting coach, a long time friend, someone I can ask for advice.”

With the intensity ramping up and the team in good spirits and bonding, the headline news from the Celtics camp was Kemba Walker’s knee and his staggered practice schedule as the team slowly gets him up to speed.

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The Celtics have also been captured in some lighter moments on-court. Jaylen Brown led the team in a mid-court shooting contest draining a long distance shot not once but twice.

The Celtics are locked in on just one single goal, which is great to hear coming out the camp, as Enes Kanter suggests:

With scrimmage games on the horizon, the Celtics have started preparing for the 8-game seeding phase which includes a first match with Giannis and the Bucks on July 31st.