Frustrations boil over in Celtics’ loss to Bulls

Or maybe it was just holiday cheer?

87It’s not often that you see the Boston Celtics log the same amount of made threes as technical fouls in a quarter, but that was the case in the fourth quarter of Thursday’s 117-108 loss to the Chicago Bulls.

On a night when Boston made just 25% of its long-distance attempts, frustrations were already high. The Celtics were playing the same brand of basketball as they always do: strong effort on the defensive end, creativity and good ball movement on the offensive end, and a high volume of three-point attempts.

It just wasn’t working.

“Yeah, I think we played a high-level defensive game in the first half, and I thought we fought for great shots,” said head coach Joe Mazzulla. “And when we, you know, I thought it was one of the times where lack of shot-making just kind of took a toll on our defense over time, and they made some tough ones, especially late in the clock. And, you know, you work the best you can to defend at a high level, regardless of the result at the other end… I think, you know, when you shoot 25% but you’re fighting for great looks, and you have a team that shoots 37% just kind of wears on you a little bit.”

Yet, they still found themselves within three points of Chicago with 5:12 to play in regulation.

Then this happened.

Both Payton Pritchard and Jaylen Brown simultaneously tied up Ayo Dosunmu for a jump ball, after the Bulls guard secured a rebound. The official, Justin Van Duyne, decided that Pritchard would be the Celtic doing the jump, and then things got testy.

Van Duyne whistled Mazzulla for a technical foul and then Brown suffered the same fate shortly after.

During his postgame availability, Mazzulla insisted that he was teched up for being on the court since that’s against NBA rules.

Though his coach wouldn’t budge, Brown had plenty to say about what happened, including his opinion that Mazzulla didn’t earn the technical.

“Here’s the thing. Like, no, you get fined (as a player),” Brown explained. “I got fined a couple of weeks ago for, like, inadvertent gestures, you know, it’s determined not a part of the game which was fine. I took the fine, but like, what part of the game is, like a ref, you know, calling an inadvertent technical foul? And then, like, I said to him, ‘You call the tech for no reason.’ He said, ‘If you say it to me again, I’m gonna call another tech.’ You call the tech for no reason, then you call the tech like, man, get out of here. You can’t threaten guys with a technical foul. That’s not part of the game either. You know, you want to find people for gestures and all this stuff. Find that like there’s some bulls—-, like, we were down three at that time on the jump ball. Then that led to us being down eight. You know that affects the game. You know that could have been avoided. Joe didn’t say anything to deserve a tech.”

From that point in the game on, the Celtics’ frustrations continued to boil over. They were outscored 18-12, Jayson Tatum picked up a technical of his own, and then tempers flared after the final buzzer.

Mazzulla had to be held back by Boston’s bench as he had some words for Van Duyne. It might’ve been the most upset we’ve seen. According to him, he was just making sure he wished the officials a Merry Christmas.

“I wasn’t sure I was going to see them before the holiday, and I just can’t let a moment go by to where you wish someone you know, just the best to them and theirs and their families.”

Don’t get it twisted, The officials are not to blame for the Celtics losing this game. The Celtics are. They failed to make shots that they would normally make and let those frustrations boil over into other aspects of their game.