Stephen A. DISTURBED by his Knicks’ loss 🗣️ ‘Celtics haven’t played like this in YEARS’ | First Take

Stephen A. DISTURBED by his Knicks’ loss 🗣️ ‘Celtics haven’t played like this in YEARS’ | First Take

Celtics rallied and then some in the absence of their star Jason Tatum who is recovering from Achilles surgery. The result was the Celtics best defensive game of the series. They suffocated the Knicks 127102 and the victory to cut the series lead to 3-2 force a game six on Friday back here in New York. Here’s Joe Missoula and Jaylen Brown postgame. Gentlemen, hello. A lot of these guys have been around the league a long time and they’ve seen a lot and uh to me you just rely on the character of the guys, the togetherness, the staff. At the end of the day, you don’t get to pick the uh, you know, the test that you have. You just pick how you respond to them and uh, you know, and that’s kind of how life works. You know, I appreciate the fans that showed up tonight. You know, it was a great atmosphere. It was loud, you know, and uh, I know it’s easy to kind of write things off. Um, obviously unfortunate what happened at JT. Um, but we still got basketball to be played. You know, I believe in this group, so, you know, don’t count us out just yet. Stephen A, what’s your concern level for your New York Knicks? It’s heightened. It’s heightened significantly. I’m going to tell you that right now. If on a scale of 1 to 10, you ask, it’s about an eight. An eight? It’s about eight. It’s about eight. You can’t lose game six. You can’t lose game six in Madison Square Garden. I’m going to tell you what I saw last night that really, really disturbed me. I’m not going to be one of those dudes. Oh, you know what? It’s the Knicks. Damn it, we’ll find a way. you better find a way, but I’m not sure they’re going to. But they better find a way tomorrow night. You don’t want to go back to Boston. They’re very familiar with those rims. Obviously, they’ve outscored the Knicks by 90 points on three-point shots in this series. Okay. Fast break points last night. They had a field day with the New York Knicks. I think it was like 31 to9 or something like that if I remember correctly. Here’s where my concern lies. Outside of Luke Cornette, okay? I mean, the man ain’t never start a playoff game, okay? He’s played start about 16 games of his career. This brother came out and looked like the second coming of Bill Walter. God rest his soul. Five blocks in the third quarter, seven blocks for the game, just erasing everything at the rim. Particularly in the second half. I couldn’t believe it. All right, but here’s what really, really alarmed me. Believe it or not, it’s not Jaylen Brown. He is getting paid 304 million for a reason. The brothers are stud. He’s the reigning NBA Finals MVP. We know what Jaylen Brown could do. Props to him for showing up last night, having 26 points, 12 assists, just two turnovers in nearly 38 minutes. What really, really concerns me is that without Jason Tatum, I haven’t seen the Boston Celtics move the basketball like that in two years. Yes, move the basketball. I’m talking about having your spacing, making sure you sharing and distributing the basketball, having faith in your teammates, and guess what? Everybody’s touching it and you don’t know who to guard because if it ain’t Jaylen Brown hitting up one pulling up for one of his mid-range game attacking the basket or hitting the occasional three, it was Derek White drilling up for like four or five threes in the first half, hitting seven for the game. By the way, he’s had 13 three point shots in the last two games. Okay? Or it’s Pritchard. I mean, everywhere you turned, Cats was shooting. And if they shoot the basketball like that, sharing it like that, the Knicks are going to have a problem. The New York Knicks defense was not great. They didn’t get back into transition defense. That was not good. But we look at the Boston Celtics and we’re reminded they’re a talented bunch. They have depth and they have a championship pedigree. Same team they had last year. These guys have been here before. New York Knicks got to win game six. Otherwise, I you I don’t I’m not confident they could go back to Boston and win a game seven based off what I saw last night. Tell you why you need to be a little nervous. They found their why. You’re talking about a team who has been to the finals, who lost to us in the E conference finals, who won it last year gets a little repetitive. You can lose your edge a little bit. The unfortunate situation with Jason Tatum has brought them together. They are motivated and it’s been a long time, Stephen A, since we’ve seen a desperate Boston Celtics. They’ve been sitting at the top of the East sitting pretty for a long time. This is a desperate Boston Celtics team and we really seeing what they made of right now. And to your point, Jaylen Brown, not only a great player, but I think he was also a leader last night. If you look at what he was doing on the sideline, all the things he was talking about, his leadership. So, for me, y’all be a little nervous, dog. Be a little nervous. I’m smiling over here. I love it. I I love this spot. Y’all put me right across from him on purpose. Y’all put me right here on purpose. I get to watch this for two hours. I’m blessed. Um, I will echo what all of you guys said, but I think to me one of the things that stood out, you’re right about the ball movement essay, but I also think the Knicks got to continue to shoot the basketball. Like they were just completely disjointed on both sides of the floor. The thing that gives you optimism, confidence I would say, going into Friday is after losses, Jaylen Brunson is averaging 36 points per game and they’re three and0. And they’re three and0, right? That those are wins. I think this team relishes in the opportunity to self-correct, to address their mistakes. I have a ton of respect for Boston. And in fact, pregame Joe Mazudula’s press conference, his common refrain was in various ways, we have complete empathy for what JT is going through, but tactically we have an opportunity in front of us. And so you could feel the emotion. You talk about that building in the third quarter of that game, that was the loudest I have heard this that building in this entire series. And so for Jaylen Brown to call out the fans, that is appropriate because they were truly in it. They were the sixth man on the floor in terms of willing their team into it. I am not usually one to go here, but I’m really curious how the officiating is going to go on Friday night because last night I had some real questions and I’m I will admit I thought the Knicks got a very friendly whistle in the first half and in the second half I I Okay, because this game is going to be physical and it is going to be chippy and I think we got to get to that line where you let us let the guys play, but it also has to be balanced on both sides. Well, let me say this to you, Eminem. I’m incredibly disappointed in what you just said because the reigning defending champions are on the brink of elimination on their home court having lost their superstar. What do you think the officials are going to do? And throughout history, throughout history, we’ve seen similar scenarios and the same thing happened. You on the brink of elimination, you’re a reigning defending NBA champion. You’re going to get calls. You got to know that if you’re the New York Knicks, you’re going to get calls the first half. They were right in it. They had Boston on its heels. Even though it was tied, the fact is they were right there. And the New York Knicks gave you every impression based on what we’ve seen from them throughout the playoffs that if it gets tight as the game waines, that’s the last position Boston wants to be in. The New York Knicks were right there. The third quarter was about them hitting shots and about Luke Cornet blocking everything under that was what that was about. I can’t look at the I’m not saying that the officiated the officials didn’t miss calls. Please don’t get me wrong, right? I’m not saying there was balance. What I’m saying is you expect that under those conditions, but even that didn’t impact the New York Knicks as much as the three-point shooting. Agree and Luke Cornet being in a race at the rim. I agree with you. But now I’m moving forward to Friday. And that is because who I don’t know what the storyline as far as officiating would be on Friday. But I think it’s going to be an important part of Friday’s game because there was a chippiness from both sides last night that had not really existed consistently through the first four games is all I’m saying. But yeah, they they didn’t defend a lick and it ain’t no way around it and they just did not play smart basketball. And I I continue to say the urgency of you need to lose weight otherwise you are putting yourself at a chance to have health problems or to pass away versus the urgency of losing weight to fit into a dress for the summer. You just can’t manufacture the urgency and the Celtics were far more urgent and far more focused than the Knicks. And you talked about how the Knicks stopped shooting the ball. Do you know the New York Knicks lost this game by 25 points? Do you know that the Boston Celtics only attempted three more shot attempts than the Knicks? The New York Knicks shot on the ball 81 times. It was not good. The Celtics shot at 84. They just thoroughly outplayed the New York Knicks. And the New York Knicks, listen, give Missoula’s mad credit looked like a complete no-show. Only had one point for the game. Was the only dude that didn’t make any shots, okay, that played really that I mean really. And Missou like, “This ain’t your night. Sit down.” Cornette going up. Quinnette play. What you call him? Uncle Luke. Uncle Luke. I’m talking about one from True Live Crew. Yeah, I call him Uncle Luke. But I’m going tell you another thing you need to be worried about what Boston did and you got to give Missoula credit for this. They targeted Jaylen Brunson every time and defensively. Every time they had an opportunity to put him in a pick and roll and get a switch, they attacked him. They attacked him. They also did the same thing with Cat. Cat on that deep drop pulling up like we losing. We pulling up like we left our phone. If you’re going to deep drop every time, they also got some threes with that. So if you got a guy like Derek White who got it going early, why are you in a deep drop? You have to make that adjustment. Like you said in that other game in New York, he was up on the screen. He wasn’t a giving away those threes. So those adjustments that I’m not comfortable watching cat do is shoot. I’m not comfortable watching him post up. Struggle shooting in the series. I know that. But I’m not comfortable watching him posting up. I’m not comfortable watching him creating contact. I’m certainly not comfortable watching him fall to the floor because it’s them 21 feet and like I mean it’s it’s suspect in terms of his leg health. I I just I get very nervous when you ask Kad to do something other than pull up from long range. Well, I I will say because we were talking about this, my terrific radio partner and I Tyler Murray third quarter teetering. As much as you look at the scoring for Kat, it was also the rebounding. The rebounding for him was huge in game four. And so when he puts up effective and impactful double digit rebounds, that matters just as much as his scoring in terms of this team keeping pace. Look, if Jaylen Brunson plays well on Friday, everything else will fall into place. Now, and to to your point as far as the adjustment, Jaylen Brown took that assignment on personally from the jump and serve. We also can’t forget to mention, first of all, Muel Bridges after loss as well. 22.7 points on 58% shooting. So, we got to pay attention to that because I think he’s going to be a key Friday night game six. Obi, who I love, um my brother one for 12. One for 12. Um six points total. I mean, a no-show. What’s up? That can’t happen Friday night. That cannot happen. The the one thing to me that is directly correlates to OJ and Obi’s production is how much the Knicks can turn the Celtics over and benefit in transition. When he gets out and run, then he’s revved up and every the basket gets bigger. But last night, they only had 11 points off of the turnovers by the Celtics. And he a one for 11 is not going to get it done. All right.

Stephen A. Smith, Monica McNutt and Udonis Haslem join Molly Qerim on First Take to react to the New York Knicks falling to the Boston Celtics in Game 5 of the Eastern Conference Semifinals in the 2025 NBA Playoffs.

0:00 Joe Mazzulla & Jaylen Brown postgame
1:26 Stephen A.’s concerns for the Knicks
4:05 Celtics “found their why”
6:14 Stephen A. is disappointed in Monica
8:05 Shooting comparison

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