BROOKLYN, NY -- This is not what Steve Nash signed up for.
Nash was brought to Brooklyn to be the superstar whisperer; to speak Kyrie Irving’s language and guide him and Kevin Durant through the regular season. When Irving said he didn’t see Nash as a head coach, this is what he was talking about. This was going to be a group of superstar talents, one of whom no longer played, discussing the game at a higher level than most and then Nash’s job was to relay the message to the rest of the team and get everyone organized from there.
It was a novel approach, for sure, but I’ll admit that I thought it was going to work. I thought it was what Irving needed. It didn't work out that way, though.
Irving has been the weak link in this entire Nets failure, but the ax will likely fall on Nash if the Celtics make the ending of Brooklyn’s series official. It was Irving’s mysterious absence two seasons ago that made the Nets feel like giving up good role players who fit well enough was necessary. It was Irving’s vaccine stance, and Brooklyn allowing him to return part time, that drove James Harden away after giving up all they did to get him.
And now Irving has the audacity to sit at the podium after their Game 3 loss and say “we're all just trying to jell. Usually you're jelling around the right time … I don't want to be too cliché, but I don't have a lot of answers for how you make up time from October until now when teams would be jelling and things would be feeling good.”
Oh you don’t? You can’t think of something that would have given this team more time together to figure out how to jell and play better?
Nash is left to pick up the pieces from the broken season, or more likely get swept up with them and get discarded at this point. When Blake Griffin sits there after the game and says the team needs to “bring a certain amount of intensity the next couple of days and also have the right spirit the next couple of days. I think it is important for us. I don’t know that our spirit was right tonight,” it’s a damning indictment of all involved.
Nash did the right thing early on in his tenure, turning the offense over to Mike D’Antoni and the defense to Ime Udoka. Now that both are gone, and with a roster full of obvious holes after the Harden trade, Nash has nowhere to turn.
I’ve been saying since this matchup was set that Nash has no adjustments in his back pocket. He dusted Griffin off after a month of not playing and Boston targeted him mercilessly. Griffin scored 8 fourth-quarter points and was still a -1. Some are calling for Nash to turn to LaMarcus Aldridge, as if he’s going to fare any better defensively.
The Nets have nothing to turn to. Meanwhile, Udoka has built his Celtics into a finely tuned machine. The way players talk after the game is often a reflection of their coach, and Boston is toeing Udoka’s steely company line.
“We don't want to be blinded or arrogant,” Jaylen Brown said after Game 3. “We want to continue to respect our opponent. We know who we're playing against. We know what they're capable of. It's a good team over there, well-coached. So we want to come out and be solid, be sound, be disciplined, and execute the game plan."
It’s a game plan that has Durant admitting that he’s thinking too much. The Celtics have beat him down and frustrated him to the point where he passing the ball to no one. He turns one corner now expecting to hit another wall. Boston has him seeing ghosts on the floor, and it’s giving the Celtics easy transition opportunities.
“(I) know him well and to say we're trying to get him rattled, that's not the thing. It’s to be physical, making it tough on him more so than anything,” Udoka said. “We believe in our individual defenders. I think that's the strength of our team is that we don't have a lot of guys you can pick on, and we believe in our team defense behind it.”
People saw the Brooklyn Nets as some sort of assault helicopter; a Blackhawk chopper with too much firepower for the Celtics to handle. Udoka knew he could pick off the rear rotor and just let the rest of it spin out of control and crash to the ground. Nash hasn’t had much of plan to combat that besides telling his guys to hold on tight.
He was never brought in to be the X’s and O’s guy, though. This is part of the problem for a former superstar trying to coach against a former role player. Udoka carved out an NBA career by being meticulous, studying, and figuring out every little angle he could to be successful. Nash also worked hard, but he had an innate feel for the game that made things easy. He never had to see the game the way Udoka did because he could just take it over by sheer will and talent.
Nash could use a few Udokas on his team right now. Hell, 44-year-old Udoka could probably step onto the court and be less of a defensive turnstile than some of these Nets Boston is picking on.
Udoka is out-classing Nash. There's no creativity in trying to find a solution in Brooklyn. And in Game 4, the Nets might make their biggest mistake and throw Ben Simmons, after a year off and who has never played with this team, out there against a physical, disciplined Celtics team.
The Celtics do not seem worried about Simmons in the slightest.
“Myself, coaching him in the past and a lot of guys in general - a lot of them played against him recently in a series, two years ago in the bubble, and Al played with him. So a lot of us know him well enough,” Udoka said before Game 2. “When it’s time to talk about what he does, I don’t think it’s a problem for our guys. We have a group that’s seen him quite a bit.”
Putting Simmons in this situation is sheer negligence, even down 3-0. If this is the best Nash can do, then the Nets can book their flights to Cancun for Tuesday.
Boston will go back home to get some rest and prepare for the next series knowing that they exploited every mismatch that was available to them in the opening round, including the one on the sidelines.