Last year at about this time, I wrote a piece highlighting — or more accurately, lowlighting— some brutal individual performances in the early rounds of the 2021 NBA Playoffs. Perhaps because I am in a better mood this year, this first piece after the start of the 2022 Playoffs will be more upbeat. Or perhaps there have been fewer brutal performances that should be lowlighted and more that deserve to be highlighted.
That being said, I will start by addressing a play that happened in Game 1 of the Nets-Celtics series. Long-time readers know I often point out that a steal or a basket in the first half counts just as much as the play that theoretically wins or loses the game at the buzzer.