Kristaps Porzingis is confident Celtics can solve recent woes

When the Celtics suffered a decisive loss to the Raptors earlier in January, Kristaps Porzingis was fairly critical of his team. Eight days later, the Celtics big was a bit more zen about the state of the team following their loss to the Lakers.

Porzingis isn’t concerned about the Celtics’ play after their 117-96 loss to the Lakers dropped their record to 10-9 in their last 19 games.

“Honestly, I think we’re starting to play better, but we didn’t have a good night tonight. We had a back-to-back, that has to go into the equation,” Porzingis told reporters, cracking a laugh as he was amused that he used the word “equation” correctly. “That’s honestly what it is, a little bit. To be honest, I feel like we are starting to play better and we’ll be fine.”

Since Porzingis said the Celtics were playing with “no spirit, no personality” after their loss to the Raptors on Jan. 16, they’ve gone 3-2. The first of those two losses came to the Hawks on Saturday, faltering late as they were without Porzingis and Al Horford in that game before losing again on Thursday.

The Celtics picked up a pair of decisive wins since then, though, blowing out the Magic and Warriors in games where they were at full strength. However, they needed overtime to defeat a severely undermanned Clippers squad on Wednesday as they played without Porzingis, Horford, and Jrue Holiday.

With the recent swings, it’s easy to have questions about Boston’s status as a title contender. But Porzingis continued to emphasize that he thinks the Celtics will be fine, even if he isn’t sure why.

“I just think it’s just, uh – I don’t know,” Porzingis said when asked why he felt sure that the Celtics would be OK. “I just feel it.”

Porzingis eventually explained that he thinks he and the team have been trending in the right direction as of late.

“I’m getting into my rhythm and we’re finding a rhythm as a team,” Porzingis said. “There’s nights like [Thursday] that, of course, happen. It happened last year. It’s happening this year a little bit more. But I don’t think we’re too far off from where we need to be. I just think we need to keep our head down, keep working and I believe we’ll peak at the right moment.”

To an extent, there are some metrics that show that the Celtics have been fine despite they’re underwhelming 10-9 record as of late. They’re fifth in the league in point differential since this 19-game stretch began, sitting fifth in net rating and in the top 10 in both offensive and defensive rating over that same period before Thursday’s game.

But the Celtics are 3-5 in the eight games decided by single-digit in that span and they’ve only had one win streak longer than two games since the first week of December. Thursday was a relatively rare blowout loss for the Celtics, though, marking just their third double-digit loss of the season.

That possibly lent more credence to the idea that the Celtics might have just been tired while playing on the second half of a back-to-back after winning in overtime against the Clippers in the day prior.

“They had a really good first half. They were really, really efficient,” Porzingis said of Thursday’s game. “We didn’t have our best game, to put it in simple words. We played with a little bit of low energy, maybe, in the first half.

“Second half, I felt like we came out better. But they already had a good lead. I think there was one good moment we had where we could’ve made it to seven or nine. We missed the free throws and then, again, they went on a little run and it slipped out of our hands. So, it was not a good night for [us]. It was a good night for them.”

Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla also pointed to the team’s transition defense and offensive rebounds as two reasons why they faltered on Thursday. Boston’s 96 points were also its second-fewest scored on the season as Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown both had sub-20-point performances a day after playing in an overtime win.

Porzingis had a good showing offensively following a rest night, scoring 22 points on 9 of 16 shooting on Thursday. As his scoring and shooting have improved from December to January, Porzingis believes that some of the Celtics’ recent issues might just be a bit more overstated.

“We had a lot of attention on us last season already,” Porzingis said when asked if the losses are viewed differently this year after winning a title last year. “Obviously, this year, after winning a championship, it’s a bit heightened. Every little … misstep is like exaggerated even more.

“Of course, we haven’t played our best. But I think we’re going to figure it out and I think we already are getting there. So, tonight was a bad night for us.”