It's fitting that Kyrie Irving's redemption arc led him back to TD Garden, where the Dallas Mavericks guard will face off with his former team in his first NBA Finals appearance since 2016. The eight-time All-Star's Celtics tenure ended in ugly fashion, and the animosity between him and the Boston fanbase was well-documented throughout his time with the Brooklyn Nets.
Irving stomped on the Celtics logo following a victory over Boston during the 2021 playoffs:
The Nets won the series in five games, but the action did not go unnoticed amongst Celtics fans, who cranked up the hostility when he returned for another first-round series the following season. Irving responded to the crowd with a middle-finger gesture at several points during Game 1:
He also responded to a fan who yelled, “Kyrie, you suck!” with an explicit phrase following the loss:
Outside of a 39-point performance in Game 1, Irving struggled mightily in the series. He averaged 15.3 points on 16-of-43 shooting from the field (37.2 percent) and 2-of-11 from three (18.2 percent) over the final three games during a sweep.
However, Irving requested a trade from Brooklyn midway through the following season and has since resurrected his career in Dallas. Ahead of his first playoff series in Boston since the 2022 debacle, he said he's better prepared to deal with the raucous environment this time around, per ESPN's Tim McMahon.
“I think I'm better at consolidating kind of the emotions now or being aware of what it's going to be like,” he said. “I will say last time in Boston, I don't think that was the best — not this regular season, but when we played in the playoffs and everyone saw me flip off the birds and kind of lose my s— a little bit — that wasn't a great reflection of who I am and how I like to compete on a high level. It wasn't a great reflection on my end towards the next generation on what it means to control your emotions in that type of environment, no matter what people are yelling at you.
“I'm built for these moments, to be able to handle circumstances like that, and I've been able to grow since then. So of course it's going to be a hectic environment, but I'm looking forward to it and I see it as a healthy relationship that I have with the fans. I almost think about ‘Gladiator,' just winning the crowd over. It is good to hear the TD Garden silent when you're playing well. They still respect great basketball.”
Kyrie Irving won't waste energy focusing on Boston crowd
Kyrie Irving will need to play great basketball for his team to have a chance against the Celtics, who rank second in offense and third in defense while posting a 12-2 record this postseason. He'll face his biggest offensive challenge this postseason against Boston's elite defensive backcourt of Jrue Holiday and Derrick White.
While he admitted he sometimes enjoys engaging with the Boston crowd, the Mavs star said he won't have energy to waste as he tries to take down the NBA's top-ranked team.
“Regardless of the attention that's being paid to what it's going to be like on my end, I have a group to lead that's going to be looking at me for a voice of peace and to be able to control what I can control and also help them through it,” Irving said. “So I'll take the brunt of it, of all the yells and stuff like that and all the remarks, but I've been able to grow since then and acknowledge that I just can handle things better, especially when I want to put the majority of my energy towards playing well.
“I can't just be getting into it with fans like that — even though it may be fun at times — but it's a waste of energy. It's a waste of my time and it's also a waste of my talent trying to answer questions from the past that people have. People are going to bring up the record and all the extra stuff. Again, there's days, there's idle time in between, so you see the media pundits doing their normal thing. It's cool. But I'm looking forward to the challenge on the court against the Boston Celtics and being able to lead my guys.”
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