The Boston Celtics swept the three-game regular-season series with the Atlanta Hawks, their opponents in the first round of the NBA’s 2023 Eastern Conference playoffs.
But the Hawks have a new head coach, Quin Snyder, who is starting to reshape the team’s style of play to something more dynamic than we’ve seen from them for most of the season. Those changes suggest there’s at least a chance the series will not be quite the sweep some are predicting.
Could the Hawks drag this series out to five or even six games? What would have to happen for that to take shape? Can we trust Boston to take a perceived lesser foe as seriously as they ought to? Do the Celtics simply have too much talent for Atlanta to have a chance of stealing multiple wins?
To get a picture of what we ought to expect from the team heading into Game 1 on Saturday, the hosts of the CLNS Media “Celtics Lab” podcast (powered by Fan Duel and Better Help) got together with Sports Illustrated’s Pat Benson to talk it over.
We also get into the latest news about awards races, merchandise sales and the health of key players on both teams, so be sure to tune in ahead of Hawks-Celtics.
Listen to the “Celtics Lab” podcast on:
Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/3zBKQY6
Spotify: https://spoti.fi/3GfUPFi
YouTube: https://bit.ly/3F9DvjQ
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