In these parts, we have become good at riding the wave of moral victories.
Saturday, the Celtics were the latest to hang-10.
Sure, they lost again to the Wizards, 116-107, in double-overtime, but there was evidently so much to feel good about. For starters, it was already the Celtics' third overtime game of the six-game season, perhaps suggesting that they are super close to actually winning these games.
In this case, there was no Marcus Smart or Robert Williams. The C's evidently tried a lot harder than was the case the last time they took the floor. And Jaylen Brown responded to his coach's very public head-scratching with a monster 34-point night that included 58 percent shooting from the floor.
The narrative coming from Ime Udoka, Josh Richardson and Brown was consistent: Scoreboard be darned, the Celtics are on their way.
"I challenged them and they responded," said Celtics coach Ime Udoka said after the game. "We had a few days of film session to clean up and get back to the training-camp-type practice and go over some fundamentals that had slipped a little bit with all these extra overtime games and trying to get the balance of getting guys rested, but also having them have practice time. They accepted the challenge and they played extremely hard tonight. No complaining about that at all; you just wish the offensive end would have caught up to our defense."
"I think it shows we're a good team and we're almost there," said Richardson, who played a solid all-around game, finishing 18 points off the bench. "I feel like once we get some more continuity on the offensive side of the ball, I think that hopefully, we'll be able to finish these games out a little quicker. Sometimes it's just an adjustment period."
"We've just got to figure out how to put these games away," Brown noted. "It shouldn't have been in overtime. We've got to make plays down the stretch. We've just got to find it, and we will. We'll find ways to win at the end."
Maybe.
But for now we are left with what is the reality of this Celtics team, and that reality was presented in big neon lights. The C's went into the fourth quarter 0-for-20 from beyond the three-point arc, ending up 2-for-26 for the game.
(Here is Payton Pritchard finally making one ...)
"Shot-making wasn't there," Udoka noted. "We relied on our defense and just came up short when we needed a few extra shots. But if we shoot like a normal or less-than-normal night, we'd be in good shape."
Let's be honest, the saving grace for the Celtics Saturday was Washington showing no willingness to play ANY defense on drives to the hoop. As painful as the Celts' help-side defense has been, it was never as bad as what the Wizards presented. No matter. They didn't need to stop anyone.
The true taste that the Celtics left in their fourth loss of the season was a craving for what will still be missing once the moral victory option has run its course. They need another shooter/scorer to truly make it feel like these days aren't going to be the norm.
The Stadium's Jeff Goodman said even before the latest loss that this team was missing the likes Evan Fournier. He wasn't, and isn't, wrong.
The Celtics have the seventh-worst 3-point percentage in the NBA, which, let's be honest, could have been worse if Smart (who is 8-for-34 from beyond the stripe this season) played in Washington.
Considering the Celtics are still taking the eight-most three-pointers per game of any team, that's not a good formula.
Jayson Tatum - who has taken the fifth-most three-pointers in the league so far, making just 27 percent of them - will make more. Dennis Schroder can make an occasional three (even though he has never averaged as many as two made three's per game). And there are always whatever minutes Pritchard gets.
And, make no mistake about it, there was some sense of satisfaction of watching a team not be beholden to chucking three-pointers.
Still, you're going to need the kind of threat that simply isn't there right now.
Aaron Nesmith isn't developing into the kind of threat the Celtics envisioned when drafting the sharp-shooter, totaling just nine minutes for the season (none of which came Saturday).
So while we sift through defensive rotations, off-and-on performances by the two J's, and the getting-to-know-you process that comes with a new coach, we can suggest that the construction of this roster seems off.
Maybe we should be optimistic. But that many misses will always leave a mark.
