Brad Stevens was interviewed after the Celtics fell to the Trail Blazers 129-119. On whether or not the referees gave any explanation on not being able to challenge calls, Stevens said “I was told the one probably wasn’t gonna be overturned. I tried to call a timeout on the second but they said I was too late…and that was right after I heard the bench errupt and knew to challenge it.”
On the late-game collision between Brown and Tatum, Stevens said “I don’t have any update on them other than they were both in different rooms being looked at.” On Marcus Smart’s suspension and whether or not there needs to be a conversation with him, Coach Stevens stated “well that was a physical play…I’ll look at the replay, and then we’ll address that internally. But obviously that was a big play at a big moment.”
On the loss, Stevens said “I think we did a lot of good things tonight. We got beat by a team that is dialed in…they are playing great basketball, they are making tough shots…we had a couple breakdowns, a couple BIG breakdowns. But Evan Fournier was good, I thought Nesmith was really good, Payton did a lot of good things off the bench…Jayson had a real roll in the first. I thought all of those guys were really good.” With the reviews, Stevens said “I thought both teams had their rhythm broke a little bit…but I thought that had nothing to do with the outcome.”
