By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net
Brooklyn Nets star Kyrie Irving thinks last season’s sweeping elimination to the Boston Celtics in the first round of the playoffs was what his team needed in order to inspire him and the rest of the squad ahead of the upcoming campaign.
On a personal level, Irving mentioned that the sweep further pushed him to work extra hard. Here’s what the seven-time All-Star guard said on The Boyz Night Podcast:
“Get ’em up. I’ve got to get them up on both ends of the floor. I’ve got to be a complete player. Coming for different hardware this year, bro. I’ve been in the lab crazy, since we got 4-0’d. It was meant to happen like that.
It was meant to happen like that. Motivation, bro. We needed it. We needed that humbling experience, especially going against the Celtics. It was already built in to be that matchup.
So we’re going to see them again. We’re going to have to. They’re going to be where they’re going to be. But those young’uns over there in Boston, bro, I got to see them grow up. So to see them doing what they did last year on the Finals stage, making it that far, I’m glad they had to go through us.”
After a tumultuous summer for the Nets with rumors that both Irving and Kevin Durant could be leaving the team, Brooklyn continues with both of them on board. Over the summer, the club hired Igor Kokoskov as an assistant coach while recently acquiring veteran forward Markieff Morris.