5 parting thoughts on an ugly Celtics road trip

The Celtics are in the midst of the toughest stretch of their regular season schedule but that fact does not prevent the reality that this team was just one Marcus Morris 3-point shot away from going winless on their West Coast road swing. They were competitive in every game but spent the majority of the contests trailing with a troubling lack of consistency on both ends of the floor.

The Celtics will ultimately bounce back from this 1-4 trip and a 7-6 start to the regular season but there are problems that loom large in an interim. Let's take stock of the trouble as this group heads back to Boston.

1. The 3-point shooting 'slumps' are starting to become worrisome: There was legitimate wonder last year within the Celtics organization which players would be able to knock down open 3s on the perimeter when defenses collapsed against dribble penetration. That ended up not being an issue at all last year but the same can't be said for 2018-19. The C's are getting plenty of wide open shots from deep but they have a number of players that just haven't found their rhythm through 12 games. We all know Marcus Smart (25 percent) isn't going to be reliable from deep, but the fact that Al Horford (27.6 percent), Jaylen Brown (27.5 percent) and Gordon Hayward (31 percent) have not resembled even average shooters over the first month of the season is a pretty big problem. All three of those players are averaging upwards of four attempts per game from downtown and given the other weaknesses involved with the C's offense (inability to get to free throw line, non-existent offensive rebounding on some nights) the misses are weighing down this offensive attack. The losses will continue to pile up if these guys don't snap out of their 'slumps' since this style of offense has no way to counteract it consistently.

2. Marcus Smart needs to play more: If you look up and down the Celtics roster, it's hard to find one or two guys that had a 'good' trip for Boston. There were bright spots here and there for some guys but inconsistency has been the name of the game for most people on this roster right now, except for a couple of guys. Stevens knows he can count on Marcus Morris to shoot the lights out from 3 and Smart to bust his ass on the defensive end and make this team better as a whole. During the team's five-game road trip, Smart had easily the team's highest net rating (plus-8), with the offense and defense looking far better with him on the floor. It doesn't make sense when you look at his individual offensive numbers (32 percent shooting) but his ability to move the ball and do the little things on both ends of the floor clearly makes an impact from a team success standpoint. He's averaging 24.3 minutes per game and that number is just too low for what has been a subpar team without him on the floor.

3. Brad Stevens needs to change something about the starting five: I've been harping on this for weeks now and little has changed within the raw numbers. The starters have played 105 minutes together and they have a negative net rating as a unit. They score ten fewer points per 100 possessions than the team average despite the fact that offense is supposed to be the strength of that group. It's obviously not time to give up on this group entirely but the fact remains that they are not clicking right now and it's costing Boston in the win-loss column.  We will look deeper into specific possibilities in the next day or two, but Brad Stevens has plenty of appealing options to work with. He could go big with Aron Baynes or Daniel Theis at center and move a wing to the bench. He could throw Smart into the mix for Jaylen Brown or Gordon Hayward (highly unlikely but would make sense from on-court standpoint). He could do both. Either way, we're getting enough of a sample size to show that the starters are doing more harm than good for now.

4. Stevens needs to do better with his rotations: Fitting these pieces together is a work in progress but the head coach certainly isn't mixing and matching to the best of his ability so far this year. His players aren't making it easy for him either, but there are no real surprises with personnel at this point. After watching his team fall into 20-point holes in three straight games, he needs to be a bit more proactive in mixing things up and be a little harsher with playing time on a night-to-night basis. He's talked about playing guys based on merit all year long but he hasn't followed those rules on a nightly basis. He has the respect of his players and should be able to bench guys in certain games without worrying about losing them. Irving is the only guy playing like an All-Star right now and everyone else on the roster should be treated accordingly.

5. The big picture still looks okay but it's going to be an uphill climb for seeding: After next weekend, the schedule is about to get a lot softer for Boston, with 13 straight opponents at .500 or below. Hayward should continue progressing more (he's a net negative so far on most nights from a plus/minus standpoint). Necessary changes will be made to shore up defensive issues. This group is not going to go into a freefall despite a tough trip. There will be something regression to the mean in the shooting numbers but that still does not take away from the fact that spotting the Raptors and Bucks a few games in the standings makes for little margin of error over the final 69 games. Those teams have played tough schedules as well and there is no guarantee that they will have a slump like we are seeing here from the C's. If Boston wants home court beyond Round 1, they need to right the ship in the coming weeks.