We’re going for it.
With four games to go and their seeding more or less locked up, the Celtics will take their last road trip of the regular season to Philadelphia and it looks like they’ll make a run for the top of the Eastern Conference.
After Thursday’s 41-point blowout in Fiserv Forum, Boston owns the tiebreaker against Milwaukee (2-1), but they’re two games back heading into the final week of the regular season. The Bucks would have to lose two games and the Celtics run the table, including sweeping the regular season series with the Sixers on Tuesday night, for a shot at #1 in the East.
The Celtics are virtually four games ahead of the 76ers in the standings; they’re three up in the loss column, but with the tiebreaker already in hand courtesy of Jayson Tatum’s buzzer beater back in February, any single win clinches the #2 seed.
Per the team’s official injury report, Jaylen Brown is questionable with a sore back. Robert Williams is out for “left knee injury management,” presumably sitting out the first game of Boston’s back-to-back with the Toronto Raptors in town Wednesday and Friday for a two-game mini-series that could be a preview of the first round of the NBA playoffs.
“I really want to win. I like winning.”
Joe Mazzulla talks managing minutes in final stretch of the regular season, & whether or not the #Celtics are focused on competing for the No. 1 seed ️ pic.twitter.com/miqFvphc8Z
— Celtics on NBC Sports Boston (@NBCSCeltics) April 3, 2023
“Game-by-game situation. I really want to win. I like winning,” Joe Mazzulla said when asked about how he’ll approach the remainder of the season.
“There’s nothing we can do about [the #1 seed],” he continued. “It’s out of our control. What we can control is playing the way we played the last eleven games. We’re 8-3 and #1 in both offense and defense. We’re doing a lot of good things. We just have to keep that going.”
So maybe the #1 seed is out of reach, but playing like the #1 team isn’t.
