Having a star-filled team as the Celtics do is great, but when the bulk core of the team has changed, it’s a major challenge for the squad’s head coach to quickly transform them into a contender. It’s a nice problem to have — having talent — but it’s still a daunting task when the talent has little experience playing together. But things get even tougher when the team goes through training camp and preseason, then loses a key star to injury just as the regular season begins. Here’s ESPN Boston reporting:
Brad Stevens was already facing a unique challenge entering the 2017-18 season, when the Celtics brought back just four players from a 53-win team and essentially asked him to rebuild a puzzle that took four seasons of perpetual piece-shifting to construct.
Then six minutes into Boston’s season-opener last week in Cleveland, Hayward fractured his ankle as he landed awkwardly after going up for an alley-oop. The team is operating under the notion that Hayward will not play again this season as he begins what Stevens has suggested is at least a five-month recovery.
With new Celtic Marcus Morris still working his way into game shape after missing the start of training camp while on trial in Arizona and Marcus Smart sidelined early in the season with an ankle injury, Stevens found himself operating with a roster in which six of his 12 available bodies were rookies.
At one point late in Tuesday’s win over the New York Knicks, Stevens had a lineup of Jabari Bird (a rookie second-round pick on a G-League two-way contract), Shane Larkin (who played in Spain last season), Abdel Nader (a 2016 second-round draft pick and the G-League Rookie of the Year while stashed domestically last season), Semi Ojeleye (a 2017 second-round pick), and Daniel Theis (a 25-year-old German import this offseason) on the floor.
