This NBA offseason has been one of the most turbulent in recent years. Teams like the Knicks and Thunder have made big-time deals for players like Karl Anthony Towns and Alex Caruso. One constant, however, has been the Boston Celtics. Their roster remains the same, with a starting five of Jrue Holiday, Derrick White, Jaylen Brown, Jayson Tatum, and Al Horford (Kristaps Porzingis is injured). Despite them being returning champs and winning their 18th championship last year, the team still has a chip on their shoulder. Tatum’s role as a benchwarmer during the Olympics and Brown being excluded by Steve Kerr from the Olympic team means the two biggest stars have more to prove.
The team opened their season on October 22nd with a blowout win over the Knicks, their best competition in the east. Winning 132-109, the Celtics, led by Jayson Tatum’s 37-point performance, tied the NBA 3-point record of 29. They were on pace to break the record, tying it with 8 minutes left in the game, but missed 13 straight threes to end the game. The Celtics shot an outstanding 47% from 3 and looked absolutely unstoppable even without their all-star caliber Center being out for the start of the season.
Even with this dominating opening day performance, in the current era of the NBA, repeating as NBA champions is very rare. Only 1 NBA team has been able to repeat in the last 10 years and no team has won more than 1 championship in the last 6 years. The last team to win back-to-back championships, the Warriors, had 2 top 15 NBA players of all time with another 2 Hall of Famers on the roster all in their prime. While the Celtics are an elite team, they had a tough path ahead of them if they want to repeat. But one thing the Celtics have that most teams
