The Boston Celtics, like all teams at the start of an NBA season, had high hopes of starting off their campaign with a win against the Detroit Pistons. But then reality punched them in the face as a familiar fourth-quarter collapse set up the Celtics to start the 2026-27 NBA regular season in a 0-1 hole as they fell to the Pistons 121-113 on this past Tuesday (Oct. 20) night.
And while there were bright spots (the historic debut of veteran forward Paul George chief among them) to file away as potential signs of later success, plenty had to go wrong for Boston to set the league record for the biggest collapse of any ball club on Opening Night in the history of the NBA as well.
So with that in mind and without further ado, let's get to decoding
the Celtics loss to the Pistons in Game 1 of the season.
Paul George turned back the clock
If you told us before the game that this was the debut you expected from the Fresno State alum, we would have had a hard time taking you seriously. But here we are, and the question remaining now is whether George can carry even two-thirds of this kind of production over the majority of an 82-game season (and of course, beyond it into the postseason) given where he is in his career arc.
The concerning aspect of this isn't just whether it would be wise to play PG-13 2 more minutes (38) than his age (36), even if it will net you a point per minute (we trust you to do the math here). It is also the apparent impact it had on the rest of the team (more on this later in a more general sense), especially Jayson Tatum.
Would it make more sense to (gasp!) bring George off the bench to split up his and Tatum's duplicative play style, or even to have the elder wing play more with the bench throughout most of the game, doubling with the St. Louis native to start and close the contest? Whatever they do, he should never be above 30 minutes per game if they hope to have him fresh for the postseason – and likely closer to 25 or even fewer minutes.
Jayson Tatum did not play like this was his team
As the header notes, he did not. And that's a big problem given the front office ripped the biggest band-aid to that being the case off with unbearable gusto this summer, sending someone somewhere we are not going to talk about for reasons of preserving cortisol in the same way Joe Mazzulla ought to be preserving Paul George's legs.
To be fair, this might have just been early-season role confusion given how long Tatum has played with a 1b as Boston's 1a player, mixed with a dash of too much respect (in the context of what his role should be with this team) for a player he grew up a fan of. Whatever the issue is, it needs remedying yesterday. If that is not splitting up more of his floor time with PG-13, it's being assertive about being the apex wing on the team.
It's also giving the game what it needs when the shot is not falling. Sometimes, that's becoming the facilitator the game is asking for, and to his credit, that did happen. But it is also focusing on fundamentals in the face of an opponent built to take away key aspects of the team's 'possession-maxing' rebounding approach, and helping to pick up the slack for bigs that were clearly out of step with the game plan, rotations, and perhaps worst of all, game shape. That did NOT happen.
Did we note the bigs were clearly out of step?
Ah, yes. We did! And it was hard not to see how unready Boston's big men were for the moment in front of them. Mitchell Robinson should probably not start. We were on board with the whole idea to avoid getting him hack-a'd in the bonus, but given what we saw, he is going to need most of a month (November, have you heard it will be by far the most brutal of the season for the Cs?) to get up to speed Boston won't really have the time for him to do so in.
Add in that he should miss most back-to-backs (of which November has many) and can is often injured given the role he plays on both ends, trusting Neemias Queta to replicate (and hopefully improve on) what he did last season is probably the wiser route given Queta's better history of availability and the importance of continuity.
We suspect this will also help the Portuguese center snap out of what we saw from him on Tuesday in the same way (smallest of sample sizes, but it's what we have) not having Derrick White be the point of attack defender most nights appears to have helped him break the slump he finished last season with. And If Garza is having that bad of a night, give Chris Cenac Jr. a little run.
The guards were fine in their roles
Both Payton Pritchard and D-White played well coming off the bench and starting respectively. There are good arguments for splitting them up, but the bulk of what went wrong against one of the best teams in the NBA at stopping rim attacks was not the fault of the guards.
However, the inability of Boston to have supporting players able to cut, slash, post up (or frankly, anything but early-clock shots from deep in the presence of packed paint and stout defense) hints at a structural issue that is both known and something that was actively made worse by Boston President of Basketball Operations Brad Stevens with a certain trade to remain unsaid.
The young wings did not take flight
And maybe that was choosing to go with Jordan Walsh against a team with no small, fast guards in place of a wing like Baylor Scheierman (who, as other have noted, plays better with starters), or even less proven but better stylistic options like Hugo González or Ron Harper Jr.
But as noted above, some of this is baked into (the best version of, not the lazy media narrative of) Mazzulla Ball. A 3-point heavy offense will limit transition opportunities, cutting, post-ups, and ball movement that is consistent and crisp enough to get teams in rotation as alternatives.
Whether sprinkling in set plays off timeouts (and spamming them when they work) is the answer, or simply better games and use of the players on the team are, something has to change. A consolidation trade might be a nuclear option later this season, but that is, as we have so subtly hinted, not a great option for a team that will need cheap depth.
The coaching staff carries some blame for this loss as well
We aren't talking early-career Joe here (though a case could have been made for a timely huddle when a familiar script was unfolding) in terms of timeout usage. And we acknowledge that what they may have been seeing in camp could also be playing a role in making decisions (e.g. Walsh not really being an optimal fit to start vs. Detroit) that seem more obvious in hindsight than perhaps they did beforehand.
But a lot of what did not work in this game came from choices made by who to play when and with whom. And frankly we trust in Mazzulla to know which elements are something that should be ignored due to context analysts and fans cannot see, and which can be remedied with rotation or tactical choices.
It's Game 1, and there are 81 more to make up ground from this lost opportunity to set the tone for one of the toughest campaigns Boston has had in front of it in years. November is coming quickly, though, so choices will need to be made as to which issues need what fixes – and soon.
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This article originally appeared on Celtics Wire: Decoding the Boston Celtics Opening Night loss to the Detroit Pistons
