The Boston Celtics have a new coaching staff, and multiple new players. The upcoming season will be a big turning point in this generations history.
For all the talk of Kristaps Porzingis and, more recently, Jrue Holiday, our attention will quickly turn to the upcoming season. There’s one goal: win a championship.
The Boston Celtics new-look roster will need time to gel, time to adjust to new schemes and systems, and time to adapt to new coaching voices within the locker room. This time last year, the Celtics faced a similar task. This year, there’s been time to plan and prepare, and there’s a roster that Joe Mazzulla likely had input on.
Mazzulla also has a new coaching staff. Sam Cassell, Phil Pressey, and Charles Lee joined the franchise and will serve as Mazzulla’s primary assistants. Again, Mazzulla likely had input on who he would work with for the foreseeable future. Cassell and Lee are two highly-respected assistants in the NBA.
Cassell has been part of three championship teams, including Boston’s 2008 roster. Lee has nine years of experience on the sidelines and was part of the Bucks’ championship run in 2021. Pressey is embarking on his own NBA coaching journey with the team that originally drafted him.
The hope is that with two very strong new voices and Pressey’s age and reliability, Mazzulla will have some new sounding boards to assess and evaluate ideas and game plans.
Fixing the cracks
Mazzulla did an admirable job in tough circumstances during his rookie season. The coaches on his staff then were his colleagues the season before, all of whom had been overlooked for the interim head coaching gig. Mazzulla had to formulate an offensive and defensive scheme in days. And then, he had to guide a franchise with championship aspirations while learning his new role on the fly.
There were issues. Mazzulla’s affinity for three-point shots was a big sticking point for many fans. At times, it made the games difficult to watch; at others, witnessing an elite display of shot-making was enthralling.
Nevertheless, there never seemed to be a Plan B, C, or D. Interior scoring and rim pressure were often chastised in press conferences, and “we didn’t take enough threes” became a common mantra throughout the year.
Driving the lane was a tool used to create perimeter shots, and teams wised up to that system before we hit the halfway point of the season. Now, with Cassell, Lee, and Pressey all having a voice, there should be hope that we see a more balanced approach to the game.
Valuing rim attempts and mid-range shots should be vital to a sustainable perimeter game. Defenses have to find themselves consistently splitting their focus. Last season, we saw teams shut down the perimeter with little concern of somebody driving the lane. Simple screening actions, two-man games, and half-court sets beyond the .5 principle will also potentially be addressed.
The Celtics now have three new voices who know what it takes to bend and manipulate a defense, who know what it takes to create high-value scoring opportunities for themselves and others, and who understand what type of actions fit specific skill sets.
Mazzulla developed a slight reputation for stubbornness during his rookie year, fairly or unfairly. With his own coaching staff in place, we will likely see a more collective approach — which he has coined as “Tribal Leadership — and, hopefully, a more diverse system that allows for greater utilization of the roster’s overall skillsets.
Individual talents
Every coach has their specialty. Ben Sullivan was known as a shot fixer. Will Hardy was an X’s and O’s coach with great interpersonal skills. Damon Stoudamire was a former NBA player with relatability and keen insights. However, Cassell is a former NBA player, a former champion, in fact. The former Celtics point guard will focus on helping teach his new team how to win while also working with Mazzulla to “help him enjoy” the journey.
“Right after the playoffs were over, (Mazzulla and I) got together, had a couple of phone conversations, and he asked me, first of all, if was I interested in coming, joining the staff,” Cassell said during an interview at Las Vegas Summer League. “I just told him it would be an honor, you know, I even heard from anybody else. It was an opportunity that I was looking forward to, and I think Joe is an amazing coach. I’m here to just help them just, you know, to enjoy that. We have a great team, and I won’t change his mentality; that’s who he is, but I’m gonna help him enjoy it a little more. That’s all.”
In Lee, the Celtics will have an assistant coach widely viewed as a future head coach in the NBA. During an interview with Jay King of The Athletic, Blaine Mueller (who has worked with Lee in Milwaukee) provided insight into the type of coach Boston is adding to their ranks.
“His workouts were so creative and at the same time intentional,” Mueller said. “He got their attention, he’d get them engaged in a workout, maybe do something different and unique, with the end goal that we need to improve X, Y, and Z. … He leverages the fact that he’s done the work in building and creating this relationship of care. Like, they know he genuinely cares about them, so then he can hold them accountable.”
Humble, hard-working, and knowledgeable are the buzzwords that come to mind when I think of Boston’s top three or four coaches heading into the new season. Mazzulla has consistently spoken of gratitude and love. Treating each other in a way that fosters relationships, even if that means confronting confrontation.
Cassell and Lee appear to have similar philosophies.
Tying it all together
Boston’s roster has undergone an overhaul this summer. Marcus Smart, Grant Williams, Blake Griffin, and Robert Williams have all gone. Kristaps Porzingis, Jrue Holiday, and many new wings will take their place. The coaching staff is different, too. However, with such wide-ranging changes, the Celtics can redefine who they are as a team.
The coaching staff can help implement a system that suits the players while staying true to Mazzulla’s core principles. The playing staff can develop a collective mindset and leadership strategies that work for them. But most of all, the team can redefine itself as a new roster with a clean slate. With one goal in mind. Nothing else matters.
Boston’s new coaching staff will work with some of the most talented players in the NBA this season. They will also help elevate an Eastern Conference finalist to a championship-caliber unit. It starts with habits. It grows with consistency. It ends with execution and determination. Not just for the players but for everyone in the franchise, front office to the announcing crew.
It’s an exciting time to be a Celtics fan. Because right now, we’re witnessing a turning point that will go down in the team’s history.
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