The East’s top-seeds are already down 0-2 in their opening round series against the unimpressive Chicago Bulls, and have lost home court advantage
It took the Boston Celtics the full 82 game season to secure home court advantage throughout the Eastern Conference playoffs and exactly two games to lose it. With their 111-97 loss at TD Garden on Tuesday night, the Celtics fell to 0-2 in their opening round playoff series against the Chicago Bulls. It marked only the second time a No1 seed has dropped their first two games against a No8 seed since the development of the current NBA playoff system.
Things felt a lot different for the Celtics just a week ago as they secured the best record in the Eastern Conference. With the accomplishment, one that looked to be a longshot just a few months earlier, Boston had cemented one of the fastest rebuilds in NBA history. They had seemingly doomed themselves to a long stretch of losing and draft-watching after first trading Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett to the Brooklyn Nets in 2013 and then shipping off Rajon Rondo to the Dallas Mavericks in 2014. Instead the emergence of point guard Isaiah Thomas – acquired from the Phoenix Suns for nearly nothing – the flourishing of unheralded players like Jae Crowder and Avery Bradley and the much-heralded skills of head coach Brad Stevens led to the a Celtics team that consistently out-played the sum of its parts.
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