Bedard: Celtics' season was an unexpected joy - but they still blew it

To be honest, I had checked out on the NBA some time ago.

The deaths of Len Bias and Reggie Lewis, the tenures of M.L. Carr and Rick Pitino, the game devolving into halfcourt tackle-basketball in the late 1990s-early 2000s and the spotlight shifting from team-oriented play to singular superstars who didn't think they needed much coaching (or didn't get it anyway), had all converged to just drive me away. I'd check in from time to time on the big games and playoffs, especially during the Celtics' run to the Finals in the last decade, but it just wasn't the same NBA I grew up with during the 1980s.

But the Celtics piqued my interest last season, especially the job that Brad Stevens was doing. And I was all in with the acquisitions of Kyrie Irving and Gordon Hayward to go along with a solid veteran in Al Horford, and intriguing young talents like Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum. With Stevens at the helm, the pieces were there for an interesting mix that could be a throwback to the kind of ball I grew up watching — great teamwork, transition offense, and unselfish play.

Things obviously looked bleak moments into the season with Hayward's injury, but the team kept plugging along and winning games. A dirtdog like Marcus Smart remained reliable as a key glue guy. Marcus Morris relished physical play and being an enforcer. And how could you not love guys like Aron Baynes, Shane Larkin, Terry Rozier and Daniel Theis?

Irving was all that he was supposed to be outside of LeBron James' shadow and more. Tatum quickly showed that he should have been the top pick in the draft — Danny Ainge doing his thing again — and Brown took a massive step forward from his rookie campaign.

And by the time Irving had knee surgery to end his season, expectations were still high for this unheralded group. Stevens knew the right buttons to push, the players executed their assignments. They were like a mini-Patriots team on hardwood, with Stevens playing the role of Bill Belichick. The players might as well have been wearing the Flying Elvis on their jerseys — they just did their job and the whole was greater than the sum of its parts. With injuries to key stars and an unexpected postseason run, it was almost like 2001 all over again.

Even Belichick, a frequent visitor to the Garden this season, couldn't hide his appreciation for the job Stevens did this season when asked by BostonSportsJournal.com.

"Coach Stevens is incredible," Belichick told me. "He always points out that the players are the ones who, regardless of the situation, have made this a special team, defying all expectations and adversity game after game after game. But he clearly is a driving force behind it. Coach Stevens is a phenomenal person, leader, teacher and strategist, and the job he does is a model for all coaches.”

So, this Celtics team and Stevens made me believe in professional basketball again. This season, from start to nearly the finish was an utter joy to watch from near and far. If these Celtics are the new NBA, then sign me up because this is a fantastic product and one I can and will definitely put my time into.

Here's the thing about all of that. The above may be true — and it is — but so is this: this Celtics season was an unexpected and overachieving wonder, but the ending one game short of the NBA Finals was a preventable disappointment and, especially when talking about Sunday night's Game 7, absolutely a blown opportunity and a choke job by some involved.

To recap, the Celtics completely blitzed the Cavs in the first two games of the series at TD Garden as they looked like they were playing a different game. To lose the series, the Celtics would have to drop four of the next five games. There was little chance of that happening. Even if LeBron James put together his greatest performance ever, he was still going to have to drag the likes of George Hill, Jeff Green, Tristan Thompson and J.R. Smith across the finish line.

No way. Not against Stevens. Not with that collection of misfits.

Then, after a long layoff spent listening to how great they were, the Celtics went to Cleveland and were blown out of the building. Game 4 was better, but the Celtics again failed to show up in the first quarter and the series was tied.

All seemed right when the Celtics easily beat the Cavs at home to take a 3-2 series lead. Game 6 was in Cleveland but, by now, Boston had learned the lessons of playing on the road and would get the job done. Certainly, when the Cavs lost second-leading scorer Kevin Love five minutes into the game, the Celtics would end the series on LeBron's homecourt. But no. The Celtics forgot how to rebound and let Hill, Green and Larry Nance Jr. beat them.

Certainly, with the scene shifting back to Boston and the friendly confines of TD Garden — postseason road warriors, these Celtics were not — the Celtics would finish the job and await the Rockets/Warriors winner. So the Celtics stunk on the road ... Rozier, Brown, Morris and Smart all shoot like All-Stars at the Garden, with one of the best home-court advantages in the league.

But it didn't happen. The pressure got to everyone not named Tatum or Horford.

I don't want to hear or read the headlines about James and his 35 points — this game was not about him. The Cavs scored 87 points. In the previous 100 games, the Celtics had played this season (regular and playoffs), they scored at least 87 points in all but five of them. That would be 95 percent.

This was not the Cavs or LeBron. This was not just "one of those nights" where the shots don't fall that everyone — from Stevens to Brown, Smart and Rozier — said it was.

You don't shoot 13 of 56 (23.2 percent) from the field and 5 of 32 from 3-point land (15.6 percent) in your own building — as Brown, Rozier, Morris and Smart did (I think somewhere Rozier, Mr. 0-for-10-from-3, is still hitting the back rim from deep) — against an average (at best) defensive team and get to say it was just an off-night.

That's called feeling the pressure in Game 7 with a Finals appearance on the line against LeBron.

In other words, everyone not named Horford and Tatum choked.

Now that ... that will happen sometimes, especially when it's your first time on a stage of this magnitude. The hope is that the players — whoever ends up returning — will be better for it next year and beyond.

"I talked about how the pain is part of the path," said Stevens, about his message to the players. "We've been really fortunate to continuously get better the last couple of years and put ourselves in better positions. But when it ends it's painful, and that is part of the path. And so we have to let it motivate us."

If the unfortunate — and preventable — end to this series was the price to pay for greater glory for the core of this team, then it will be all worth it.

This team and this season gave us an unexpected run to the brink of The Finals. It was a blast and, for some of us, it brought us back full-force into the game. Can't wait to do it again next season, with a changing NBA landscape, and when Irving and Hayward will be back at full strength.

But forgive me if I'm not ready to view this season as anything other than a rousing success. The Celtics should be preparing for The Finals. They're not, and that's because of their own failings — not LeBron's doings.