Key events
Celtics 9-10 Mavericks, 6:44 left, 1st quarter
Tatum drives and is fouled. He hits both free throws.
Dončić lumbers into the lane and somehow gets his shot up and over Horford.
Brown and Dončić trade baskets. Dončić already has 6. He has started quickly in the last couple of games, then fallen off. And, in Game 3, fouled out.
Long shots are missed.
Irving drives, Tatum gets the block (maybe with some contact). Lively gets the rebound, Horford definitely makes some contact.
Irving drives and finishes this time, and the Mavs lead.
Dončić commits Foul No. 1 at the other end, and we’re at the first timeout.
Celtics 5-4 Mavericks, 9:45 left, 1st quarter
Tatum drives but is sturdily defended.
Instead, the first scorer of the evening is Kyrie Irving. Then Luka Dončić.
But before we see a replay of the last couple of games, in which Dallas has leapt to an early lead, Brown makes a layup and Tatum hits a 3.
Celtics 0-0 Mavericks, 11:59 left, 1st quarter
We have begun.
Reminder: I’m taking suggestions for matching up film characters with Celtics or Mavericks players.
Not sure why, but I’m starting to think of Dončić as Han Solo. Would Irving be Obi-Wan? Yoda? Or, given the fact that he has switched sides a few times in his career, Anakin?
The curious stat on which ESPN is focusing: Boston has not yet lost a road game in the playoffs this year. They lost twice at home.
No wonder they’re favored in this one.
Luka Dončić just headed the ball. Planning a trip to Euro 2024?
Tipoff in 18 minutes. Allegedly.
Preamble
Kyrie Irving is the Deadpool to Luka Dončić’s Wolverine, Andrew Lawrence writes in the highly recommended story linked below.
So which fifth-division English soccer team will Irving be buying?
On that note, which film characters are the Celtics? Maybe Jayson Tatum as Batman, always out to prove that he belongs in the pantheon of superheroes despite public skepticism? Or would that make him one of the Ghostbusters? Would Jrue Holiday be Reed Richards so that his wife – Lauren Holiday, a soccer Hall of Famer – would be Sue Storm? Wouldn’t Sue Bird be Sue Storm because she played for the Seattle Storm, which would make Megan Rapinoe … OK, I don’t know enough about extended cinematic universes to make this work.
The actual news: Kristaps Prozingis can play tonight. Well, maybe.
Joe Mazzulla says Kristaps Porzingis is available, but he will “only be used in specific instances, if necessary.”
— Tim Bontemps (@TimBontemps) June 14, 2024
What “specific instances” would those be? Maybe if Boston has an opportunity to close things out and sweep this series in tonight’s Game 4? Surely they’d want to save him for Game 5 … if necessary. Or Game 6 … if necessary. Or Game 7 …
That couldn’t happen, right? Don’t tell that to Boston fans. Superstition weighs heavily in the minds of that city’s supporters, the result of going more than 80 years between World Series victories, with many a defeat snatched from the jaws of victory. And if you believe in karma or luck evening out, then Boston must be unnerved knowing that the only Major League Baseball team to come back from an 0-3 deficit to win any playoff series is … the 2004 Boston Red Sox, who went on to end the Curse and win the Series.
No one has ever come back from 0-3 down in an NBA playoff series. The last team to force a Game 7 was … let’s look this up …
Wait a minute …
The Boston Celtics.
Last year.
And then they lost Game 7 at home.
Sports are strange.
Beau will be here shortly. In the meantime, here’s Andrew Lawrence on Kyrie Irving’s series so far:
Late in Game 3 of the NBA finals on Wednesday night, the Dallas Mavericks were on the brink. They had mostly clawed back a 21-point deficit to get within three points of the Boston Celtics. Then Luka Dončić, the Mavs’ superstar scorer, fouled out – the first time he’d ever done so in a playoff game.
That left Kyrie Irving, the Deadpool to Dončić’s Wolverine, to carry the day. And when he went on to score Dallas’s next four points, including an 18ft jump shot that cut the Boston lead to one, it looked as if the Mavericks might actually make this a competitive series. But it was not to be. Boston are simply too good and too tough. The result, a 106-99 Celtics victory on Dallas’s home floor, puts the Mavericks in a 0-3 series hole, a margin from which no NBA team has ever come back. And it came just when Irving, who scored a game-high 35 points, had two quiet games to start the series.
This NBA season has been notable for Irving’s deafening silence in the face of endless opportunities to speak his mind. Forget the wars going on around the world and the protests on US campuses. Irving kept things low-key when LeBron James, the championship-winning running mate Irving seemingly couldn’t wait to get away from, went on his podcast days before the finals to say how much he missed playing with “the most gifted player the NBA has ever seen.”
And there are signs Irving is a much better teammate these days. After Wednesday’s loss to the Celtics, his first thoughts were for Dončić.
“You just got to let it breathe a little bit,” Irving said about what he wanted to tell his co-star. “Let the human emotions come out. Just give him a hug. That’s it, man. It’s easy to point the finger at just him, say, ‘You could be better.’ That’s easy to say. I think he knows that. But, yeah, it’s reiterating that I have his back, we all have his back.”
You can read the full story below:
