Brad Stevens: 'I Did a Bad Job' Managing Celtics' Issues After Loss vs. Bucks

The Boston Celtics' tumultuous 2018-19 season came to an appropriately underwhelming end Wednesday night with a 116-91 loss to the Milwaukee Bucks in Game 5 of the Eastern Conference semifinals.

After losing the series 4-1, Boston head coach Brad Stevens made no excuses. 

"Our issues have been well-chronicled," the sixth-year coach said to reporters, according to The Athletic's Jay King. "And hats off to them. ... They're better than we are, and they earned that, and it was clear throughout a five-game series."

Stevens went so far as to say, "I did a bad job" when addressing the Celtics' failure to sniff the high expectations surrounding them entering this season.

From All-Star point guard Kyrie Irving publicly calling out his teammates in January to Marcus Morris admitting "it's not fun" to play with this Celtics team in February, and Jaylen Brown calling the organization's environment "toxic," the issues Stevens vaguely alluded to were countless.

It all came to an ugly head against the Bucks. After taking Game 1 of the series 112-90, the Celtics were flat-footed for the next four games in which Milwaukee outscored them by 65 points. 

And no Celtic struggled more than Irving. 

The 27-year-old impending free agent shot 25-of-83 from the field since Game 1. After Wednesday night's loss, Irving side-stepped questions about his future. 

"I'll be honest with you," he said, according to ESPN's Tim Bontemps. "I'm just trying to get back to Boston safely, spend time with my friends and family, decompress, do what human being(s) do."

While Irving's decision whether to return to Boston is the largest issue surrounding Stevens' squad this summer, there are plenty of other questions that need answering if this team as currently constructed plans to contend the way it was expected to on paper.