The Boston Celtics have strung together an impressive season. They currently sit second in the Eastern Conference, four games behind the Detroit Pistons and 1.5 games ahead of the New York Knicks. More importantly, they recently added Jayson Tatum back to the rotation after he missed the majority of the season with an Achilles injury.
Mazzulla’s team is playing a distinct brand of basketball. The Celtics are tough, defensively sound and effective from all three levels of the floor. As such, former NBA guard John Wall is picking them as his favorite to come out of the Eastern Conference this season.
“I’ll go with the Boston Celtics,” Wall recently told Heavy on Sports. “I feel like they’re the favorites to win the East.”
However, if the Celtics are going to reach the mountaintop for the second time in three seasons, they will likely need to overcome one of the Oklahoma City Thunder, San Antonio Spurs, or even the Los Angeles Lakers. The Western Conference is loaded with talent. As such, Boston will need to be at its absolute best if a 19th banner is going to be raised in the TD Garden.
Nevertheless, for a Celtics team that was expected to struggle this season, making it to the NBA Finals would be seen as a huge success. Furthermore, it would be a monumental achievement for Tatum, as he continues to recover from such a significant injury.
“It would be a TV story,” Wall told Heavy on Sports. “You come back after 10 months and get your team back to the Finals…The most important thing is finding your rhythm, finding your legs underneath you, and not thinking about the injury.”
Boston still has 13 games remaining in the regular season, including Friday’s matchup against the Memphis Grizzlies. However, with their current seeding and the way they’ve been playing, a deep postseason run appears inevitable. We could be witnessing one of the most memorable and unlikely seasons in recent memory.
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