As a sports city, Boston has probably enjoyed more success than most with its “Big Four” teams.
Over the course of two decades to start the 21st century, the New England Patriots won six Super Bowls. The Boston Red Sox are a perennial factor in October. The Boston Bruins have been a spring fixture for years. And only the Los Angeles Lakers can match the Boston Celtics in NBA titles with 17 apiece.
So, whenever one of these squads falls short, fans from other towns naturally revel in their shortcomings. It’s the Celtics and Bruins’ latest embarrassing failures that had a lot of schadenfreude for Boston coming to the surface.
A little over a month ago, the Bruins lost a home game 7 to the eighth-seeded Florida Panthers in the NHL playoffs. With the Celtics now falling in a home Game 7 to the eighth-seeded Miami Heat, the city of Boston is the first to ever lose two home game 7s to an eight seed in the NHL and NBA … in the same season.
Boston becomes first city to lose a home Game 7 to an 8-seed in both hockey and basketball in the same season.
— John Hollinger (@johnhollinger) May 30, 2023
Woof. Absolutely brutal. (But also hilarious!)
Is it any consolation that the two teams who eliminated the Bruins and Celtics — the Florida Panthers and Miami Heat — both wound up qualifying for their league’s respective championship series?
No, no. I suppose not.
Fans on Twitter loved learning about the bottomless depths of Boston sports this spring.