Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla says he should have called timeout on last possession of overtime in Game 4

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In the immediate aftermath of the Boston Celtics’ 116-115 loss in Game 4 of their second-round series against the Philadelphia 76ers on Sunday, coach Joe Mazzulla did not express much regret about the final possession, which ended with the ball in Marcus Smart’s hands as time expired. 

No, the Celtics did not get a shot off, but “that was the play,” Mazzulla told reporters. “We just had to play with a little bit more pace. We had the right matchup. Jayson [Tatum] got downhill, made the right play at the rim.” Boston “got [Tyrese] Maxey in the pick-and-roll, and [Tatum] made the right play. We just didn’t play fast enough.”

The problem, in other words, was not that Mazzulla did not call timeout. It’s that the Celtics took their sweet time and time was not on their side. 

On Monday, Mazzulla changed his tune … kind of.

“At the end of overtime, you know, hindsight’s 20/20, I should have called it to help us get a 2-for-1 or get a couple more possessions,” Mazzulla told reporters, via CLNS media. “And so, obviously, with 14 seconds left, down one, you want to get as many chances as you can, so I’ll definitely learn from that.”

His point, however, was not that coaches must always call a timeout in that situation. He didn’t even say that he should have called timeout right after James Harden’s corner 3 fell through the net. Ideally, Mazzulla would have liked the team to have “a clear understanding as a team that we gotta go faster to get a shot.” Since that didn’t happen, he could — and, in retrospect, should — have called timeout during the play. 

“Once we’re losing pace, I gotta call it, so we can get a shot up earlier,” Mazzulla said.  

A couple of notes on this:

1. Pace was the main thing

Please look at how casually the Celtics got into the set: 

If the score had been tied and they wanted to make sure they would get the last shot, this approach would have made sense. Down by one, they needed to sprint down the court, run an action immediately and take the first open shot they could get.

Should Mazzulla have called…

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Source link : https://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/celtics-coach-joe-mazzulla-says-he-should-have-called-timeout-on-last-possession-of-overtime-in-game-4/

Author : James Herbert

Publish date : 2023-05-08 21:40:02

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