Celtics aim to stick together amid a tumultuous week across NBA

LOS ANGELES -- The NBA is known for its compelling storylines and it has lived up to expectations on that front over the past few days. Whether it's emotional team meetings in Cleveland or Washington, a potentially unhappy star in San Antonio or the dramatic firing of Jason Kidd in Milwaukee, plenty of teams across the association appear to be in some kind of disarray.

The Celtics are dealing with a little adversity of their own in the midst of a season-high, three-game losing streak prior to Tuesday's game with the Lakers. Their problems are comparatively small when put up against the drama that other franchises are currently experiencing though. At shootaround on Tuesday afternoon, Brad Stevens reflected on how he has tried to keep his squads together over the years, while acknowledging that most teams deal with rocky situations like we're seeing now at some point or another over 82 games.  

“We have players that care about the whole and enjoy being around each other," Stevens said. 'That doesn’t mean, like any other team, that you’re not going to have moments where you disagree or you communicate or things need to be said. That’s just part of teams.

"I kind of laugh when I read so-and-so had a team meeting – like, yeah, everybody does that. All the time. That’s the way it works. That’s the way teams work. We’re together six months out of the year and it’s 82 games and you don’t sleep a lot and that’s just part of a team dynamic. So I don’t put a lot of stock into it to be quite honest. But I do think our guys are connected. They care about each other, they care about trying to play the right way, and we’re just anxious to play.”

The head coach also spoke about his own in strategy in how he attempts to keep any type of internal strife from causing headlines publicly.

“I don’t say anything other than this is – every team goes through things where you need to have honest communication, raw communication with each other," he said. "Coaches, players, whatever the case may be, that’s part of team sports. But now, we don’t do much with talking about, ‘This is what you have to say,’ or anything like that.”

Kyrie Irving managed to escape some of the drama that has plagued Cleveland this past summer, but he is not at all surprised at how widespread team issues have become league-wide.

"You said surprised? Like I said, things happen, man, in the league," the All-Star noted. "And I think that now that it’s becoming even more of an onus for the media to spotlight some things that are going on. Social media, you add that then it’s like 10-times worse. And, yet, it still remains that I feel like people are human beings and they go through things and life happens and all this basketball stuff is great and we’re professionals but we never know what’s really going on until somebody actually comes out and says it.

"And they have to figure out as a team how to collectively put it together. I think that everyone can say the same thing in that. As teams, we go through ups and downs and lulls and it’s just the way you respond is the most important thing. That’s all."

The Celtics will get their chance to respond during this four-game road trip over the next seven days. With a floundering offense (30th in NBA in January) and inconsistent defense in spurts, this group could start pointing fingers at each other or try to solve the problem together. Al Horford is hopeful it will be the latter.

"I think it's for us to come together even tighter and go out and do the things we need to do," he explained. 'We have to set the tone on defense, that has to be our mindset and sticking together. I think that through ups and downs -- we haven't really been through a down-down as a team this year -- so this is a great time for us to make sure that we're together and that we do it as a group."