Have you heard about Beneath the Banners? If ya haven’t, ya should.
Beneath the Banners, presented by New Balance, is the Boston Celtics’ all-access series that brings fans as close to the team’s daily ongoings as they’ll ever get – unless they somehow make the team, I guess?
Seriously, this is unprecedented access that no other outlet can provide. Not ESPN. Not NBC Sports Boston. No one.
Think offseason workouts with Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown in Los Angeles. Think Joe Mazzulla addressing the team in the locker room following big wins and losses. Think car rides to practices and games with members of the team.
Just think about being everywhere with the team, all the time.
This season’s first episode dropped in late-October and featured exclusive War Room access from Draft night, the car ride from the airport with Kristaps Porzingis upon his arrival in Boston, and footage from Tatum’s and Brown’s summer workouts together in Los Angeles, among much, much more. Intrigued? Watch it here.
Now as for the second episode? It just dropped today, and we’re gonna give you the run down of its highlights below. If you feel like skipping the words? Go ahead and watch it here.
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This episode takes us from Media Day through the team’s first game of the season at TD Garden. We’re talking exclusive training camp footage where you can hear Joe Mazzulla coaching the team up, as well as plenty of footage of Paul Pierce supporting the team at camp.
One of the must-watch segments of the episode features new assistant coach Sam Cassell. The content team slapped a mic on Cassell during practice, so you get to listen to his coaching style and delivery to the players. There’s one moment when he’s working with Payton Pritchard and brings up a simple tactic Dwyane Wade used to use to gain an advantage – a move that helped Wade throughout his Hall-of-Fame career and one that could help Pritchard moving forward.
It’s those simple teachings that you’d just never know about without watching Beneath the Banners.
Next up, the episode takes viewers into Opening Night in New York, where the Celtics held off the Knicks during crunch time for a 108-104 win. As the team celebrated in the locker room after the W, a camera caught Mazzulla telling the team, “When we’re the tougher team and we execute, it’s a game-changer. We need games like that in order to grow.”
When was the last time you rode in a car with Brad Stevens? Never? Say no more. We got you.
The next segment is two straight minutes of cutups of Stevens addressing the camera as he drives to the Auerbach Center. He comments on everything from the differences between being the president of basketball operations and being the head coach, to his workload when trying to pull off a trade for the likes of Jrue Holiday, to what he’s paying attention to from a macro perspective.
“You do have times where it’s, sit back and really evaluate at a higher level, to think about the team,” Stevens shared. “Where [the team is] going to be in a few months, where it’s going to be in a few years, where it’s going to be (long term), and where we want to go.”
Stevens has been crushing it in his role of overseeing the team’s basketball operations and building the roster. He put together what is widely considered to be the best top-six rotation in the league, with Derrick White, Holiday, Brown, Tatum, Porzingis and Al Horford combining forces.
That crew has operated at a high level early in the season, and their home opener against Miami was one of the best examples. That matchup is where the episode closes out, showcasing Derrick White’s chase-down block of Jimmy Butler to help the C’s close out a 119-111 win – a partial exorcism of their demons from last season’s Eastern Conference Finals loss to the Heat.
One of the behind-the-scenes cameras caught Brown entering the locker room after the emotional win.
“Way to fight fellas! Way to fight!” he said. “Won’t back down from nobody … We got some dogs in here.”
So what are you waiting for? Do yourself a favor and go watch it now!