Another blowout loss leaves Celtics searching for answers as stakes are raised

TORONTO -- When the Celtics locker room opened to the media after Tuesday’s 118-95 blowout loss to the Toronto Raptors, an unfamiliar sight greeted reporters for a postgame: Danny Ainge sitting and chatting next to Kyrie Irving at his locker.

Ainge is around the team a lot and he will make cameos in the locker room after games here and there but the symbolism around this picture was telling. We’re not going to speculate about the conversation the duo were having, but there’s no mistaking the stakes at play here for Ainge after watching his team drop its third straight game after the All-Star Break in ugly fashion to a motivated Raptors squad that looked more potent than ever after adding a pair of useful veterans (Jeremy Lin, Marc Gasol) on the trade and buyout market over the last couple weeks.

Ainge declined to make any additions, instead betting on a talented core that he believed would round into form despite a tumultuous opening 50 games full of inconsistency and internal squabbles.

The early results on that bet are in and they aren’t pretty. Boston has now lost five of their last seven games since the trade deadline, mixing in horrific blown leads (Clippers, Lakers) with blowout losses on the road (Bulls, Raptors). As the postseason inches closer, the Celtics appear to be on the verge of falling apart, rather than pulling together, all while Irving judges whether this is the team he wants to play with over the long haul.

The refrain in the Celtics locker room on Tuesday night was consistent and alarming at the 61-game mark of the regular season: A group that isn’t on the same page, but one that believes things will be fixed in time for the postseason. 

“We’re just not together,” Marcus Smart explained. “Last couple years, we were together. Whenever things hit, we’d become stronger. We’re not there yet. And like I said, we’re going to get there. It’s just taking time.”

The standard loss for this team on the road has become fairly predictable at this point. After a solid first quarter (two-point lead), the team struggles on the road when it goes to the bench unit. The Raptors blew the game wide open with an 18-0 run to start the second quarter and ultimately pushed the deficit to 36-13 at the end of the frame, preying on constant turnovers by Boston (eight) and a lackluster defense that produced plenty of open looks from 3.

“Same old, same old,” Brad Stevens said of the stretch. “Obviously we struggled to score in those stretches, and then that bled into transition defense, bled into our defense. I thought we were all over the place defensively tonight. And when I say 'all over the place,' I mean we were really ... we were taking a lot of short cuts, and that hurt us. But that stretch certainly hurt.”

The drop off in defense hasn’t been an isolated trend either. Boston has allowed 112 points per 100 possessions in their last nine games, which is nine points worse than their season average. They have quickly morphed from an elite defensive team to an inept one in certain contests, even though there have glimpses of their potential during that stretch.

“I thought we were really good against Milwaukee,” Stevens said. “So it's not like we don't know what we need to do but, for whatever reason, we've taken too many short cuts. You can't do that against any team. Certainly tonight, they exposed us and played great.”

That type of criticism wasn’t taken particularly well in the locker room by a few of the veterans.

“Next question,” Marcus Morris said when asked about whether the team was taking shortcuts.

“I don’t know. It’s up to Brad,” Irving added when asked the same question.

The buy-in from veterans with Stevens may be starting to fade a little bit as things go south and he sticks with the same young pieces that continually lead the C’s into trouble. Stevens tried some tweaking on Tuesday night (staggering Smart and Irving to take the ball out of the hands of Terry Rozier) but it didn’t matter on a night the team couldn’t buy a bucket from 3 (6 of 30) or defend the perimeter adequately (17-of-36 from 3 for Raptors).

Toronto is easily the toughest matchup in the East for this Celtics team and their new personnel in Lin and Gasol make them an even tougher out, outclassing the likes of Daniel Theis, Gordon Hayward and Rozier on the Celtics bench. Brad Wanamaker may have gotten a chance tonight over Rozier but he was sick. Semi Ojeleye didn’t see action until the Celtics were down 30. At some point, Stevens has to tighten up his rotation or try some new pieces because this formula on the road isn’t working.

In the past, this group thrived on overcoming adversity, but that type of fight just hasn’t been present with this unit.

“We’re just not together,” Smart explained. “Last couple years, we were together. Whenever things hit we’d become stronger. We’re not there yet. And like I said, we’re going to get there. It’s just taking time.”

The reason why Smart remains confident about a turnaround so late in the season wasn’t exactly inspiring either.

“Because everybody here’s professional, everybody here plays basketball and everybody is really talented on this team,” he said. “And I know the potential that we all have. So it’s just a matter of time.”

The season is far from lost at this point with 21 regular season games remaining, yet the upcoming schedule will make it a stiff challenge for this group to get on the same page in the next few weeks. Eight of their next 11 opponents are above .500 teams so the possibility very much exists that things will get worse before they get better, all while the backdrop of Irving’s future hangs over this team. It’s evident that frustration is building with the All-Star as he kept most of his answers very brief for the second half of his postgame press conference, refusing to answer whether he thought this team was playing together.

“A few shots didn't go our way, obviously,” Irving said. “Starting off the second quarter, it's tough to build momentum and go into a hole like that. We just have to be better as a team, especially going into these last 19 games, heading into the playoffs. Obviously, you can't get into situations like that where you give up easy baskets and where you give up 21-4 runs.”

From this point forward, the pressure is only going to build as the microscope zeroes in on this group. We’ve seen other squads sort things out before after ugly late-season losses (2018 Patriots say hello) and Al Horford believes this group can be a similar story.

“I think it’s just been a season with a lot of expectations, and we’ve struggled,” he admitted. “At times we’ve played really good, other times we’ve struggled. It’s been up and down. I really believe that as long as we’re sticking together when the going gets tough and we continue to stick together, I feel like we can figure this out.”

Whether or not they are willing to stick together remains to be seen, but a very big piece of the team’s future (Irving) may very well depend on it. After dropping to 2-9 against plus-.500 teams on the road this year following Tuesday’s loss, this doesn’t have the look of a team that can win three straight postseason series on the road.