Boston Celtics: The one thing they need to become NBA champions

The Boston Celtics are one of the NBA’s most talented teams, yet they’ve struggled to live up to their championship potential. In wins over Golden State and Sacramento, did the Celtics finally find the missing ingredient to their championship aspirations?

It was a small gesture that spoke volumes about the difference between the Boston Celtics and the Boston Bruins, two championship contending franchises.

In his first home game with the Boston Bruins, Weymouth native Charlie Coyle dropped the ceremonial first puck. It was “First Responder’s Night” at the TD Garden and Bruins captain Zdeno Chara would normally do the honors.

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Instead, Chara deferred to Coyle and, with one selfless act, welcomed Coyle to the team and made his homecoming that much more special.

Just a few days earlier, the Boston Celtics best player and, in many respects, unofficial team captain was asked if the Celtics might struggle in the playoffs.

Following an embarrassing, and what should have been humbling, loss to the Chicago Bulls, Kyrie Irving said: “no, we’ll be fine.” Asked why Irving replied, “because I’m here.”

It was as tone deaf a statement as any Irving has made. After all, Irving himself performed admirably in the loss, dropping 37 points and dishing out 10 assists. Yet the Celtics still lost to a team with just 15 other wins to their credit.

This following Irving’s other, more colorful comments and a February that ended with a 2-6 stretch and four straight losses to the Bucks, Bulls, Raptors and Trail Blazers. Clearly things weren’t fine and Irving alone was not enough.

But oh what a difference two games, and a cross-country flight can make. If the Celtics hit rock bottom in February, they quite literally turned the page with the arrival of March, nabbing two huge road wins over the Golden State Warriors and Sacramento Kings.

Just as important, however, is that the entire vibe around the team changed. Irving and Gordon Hayward both credited the “long plane ride” for helping the Celtics snap out of their funk.

The newfound togetherness showed both in their play (they dropped an impressive 38 assists in the win over the Warriors) and in their attitude.

For example, watch 6’1″ Terry Rozier shove 6’11” DeMarcus Cousins in defense of his teammates Aron Baynes and Jayson Tatum

https://twitter.com/NBCSCeltics/status/1103167704733765633

While the emotions are polar opposites, the statements behind Rozier’s shove and Chara’s gesture are similar. While individual talents shine, the Celtics and Bruins play team sports.

Much of the Bruins success this season can be credited to the talents of their otherworldly first line. But the Bruins are the hottest team in the NHL even without leading goal scorer David Pastrnak because of the recent contributions of his less talented teammates.

True leaders like Chara realize this, which is why he made a point of so quickly showing Coyle just how important he is to this Bruins team.

No one outside the team knows for certain what was said on the Celtics flight to the west coast. But for at least a couple of games, the Celtics finally played like a team. Assistant coach Micah Shrewsbury made an illuminating comment about the team’s film study following the loss to the Rockets.

"“And guys were speaking up,” Shrewsberry said. “They’re seeing different things or talking about what they see and how they can help the next guy.”"

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How they can help the next guy. If the Celtics want to build off this momentum, reach the NBA Finals and maybe, just maybe, capture their 18th NBA championship, Irving and his teammates would do well to remember that.

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