The second quarter of Game 2 was coming to a close when Isaiah Thomas began to hobble in pain. Hopping over to the Celtics bench, he stressed his right hip as the main area of concern and grimaced whenever he made leg movements. Celtics Coach Brad Stevens looked on with despair as his best player, the one he has relied on to carry the team throughout the entire playoffs, got injured in a game where the team was also losing by more than forty points. It couldn't get much worse.
The worst place to put a junkyard dog is against a wall. And that's exactly what the Cleveland Cavaliers did.
The Celtics returned after an embarrassing 130-86 Game 2 loss to beat the Cavaliers in Cleveland, 111-108.
Coping with their loss
Losing PG Isaiah Thomas, who, after the best season of his career, solidified his role as the best player on the team, the Celtics might as well have forfeited the remaining games in the series. Having averaged nearly thirty points, Isaiah Thomas left a huge hole that seemed nearly impossible to fill.
However, coach Brad Stevens silenced his outspoken critics Sunday night when his Isaiah Thomas-less squad successfully attacked LeBron James, arguably the best player in the world, in his home at Quicken Loans Arena.
With Isaiah out for an indefinite amount of time, the torch passes to Avery Bradley, who has proven himself more than ready to accept the honor.
Bradley's hot hand is averaging 18 points in the Eastern Conference Finals so far, as he looks to increase that number now that a new hole must be filled.
"We knew that Friday was a 46-point disaster. [It's] worth one. It wasn't worth all four. It was worth one." Brad Stevens told ESPN. "So we got back together and [Saturday] was a little bit tough; [Sunday] we had our spirit back."
Where to go from here
It's no secret that Brad Stevens received monumental criticism for not being able to successfully lead a playoff team to the heights that were expected.
Stealing a win in Cleveland was huge. If the Celtics can replicate the same execution that they demonstrated in Game 3, then then they should not count themselves out of this series yet. The Isaiah Thomas injury was a massive blow to both their morale and their stats, but Game 3 proved that the team can get the job done.
"A lot of people doubting us out there, thought we were finished," said Celtics center Al Horford, who had 16 points and 6 assists Sunday night. "Heart. We got heart. This team's got heart. We got beat bad, but it's all about how you rebound, and we bounced back tonight."
