Every morning, we compile the links of the day and dump them here… highlighting the big story line. Because there’s nothing quite as satisfying as a good morning dump.

Effectively, the Celtics failed to score a single point without Thomas during the first two quarters. That sentence probably deserves caps lock, but we’ll leave it in regular lettering since nothing that insulting should be said at anything greater than a whisper. After Thomas subbed out late in the first quarter, Jae Crowder hit a free throw to give his team a 24-23 lead. Because the wing earned the trip to the line with Thomas on the court, we’ll count that as a point scored with Thomas. Over the next 5:48, the Celtics went 0 for 9 from the field with a pair of turnovers while Milwaukee went on a 13-0 run.

By the time Thomas returned, the Celtics trailed by double-digits, 34-24. They spent the rest of the night trying to make up for that period of blah. 

“It’s frustrating but, I mean, things happen,” Thomas said. “We just have to figure out how to be successful at those times (when I’m on the bench). And I believe in Coach, I believe in the rest of the guys that are on this team. They just need to have confidence and make plays. That’s all it comes down to.”

Mass Live — Without Isaiah Thomas, Boston Celtics have been sinking lately

It was a banner night for Isaiah Thomas when it comes to statistical milestones– a new franchise record for three-pointers in a season and joining rarified Celtic air as a 2,000 point scorer this season.

It was also, quite likely, a banner night for Isaiah Thomas’ future bank account, though I’m sure at this point he’d gladly substitute it for a Celtics win. The Celtics were completely lost without Thomas last night, and it in turn lost the Celtics the game. The Celtics bench, while top-heavy with a few key contributors (when everything is going well) has lacked consistency from spots 7-10. Last night is what it looks like when everything goes wrong: Let’s count Marcus Smart as an extension of the starting lineup– a true sixth man even with his shot isn’t falling.

I would say Kelly Olynyk was missing in action, but, I mean, what action? He barely played. After getting abused by Greg Monroe a few times, Olynyk air-mailed a pull-up jumper and then spent most of his time on the bench. He finished with the one shot attempt and zeros across the rest of his stat line in seven minutes. I’m sorry but any guy who’s part of a Kevin Durant to Boston pitch shouldn’t be putting up lines like that. Yuck.

Jaylen Brown, who has arguably become the third guy off the bench, was a team worst -21. He’s going to be great, but the Celtics are trying to win playoff series’ and they need him to be consistently solid right now. Stevens pushed every button last night looking for bench combinations, and couldn’t find any that worked. He even took James Young out of moth balls. Other than one 3-pointer, Young looked completely dazed and confused defensively. Terry Rozier was back, and while boundless energy is a constant, so is clanking a majority of his shots, which he takes liberally as teams dare him to pull the trigger.

Here’s the real concerning part: Isaiah Thomas will need to show he can make the same impact he has in the regular season in the post-season. In a limited sample-size over the last two seasons, he hasn’t been able to take over games let along will the Celtics to a series win. The Cs starting lineup is in a better place than it was last year, their sixth man is in a better place than he was last year. The bench? Remains to be seen. But it won’t matter what Isaiah Thomas can do unless members of the Celtics’ second unit, whomever they end up being, can contribute.

Related links: 

Herald — Bulpett: New problem for Celts; how to score with Isaiah Thomas on the bench

CSNNE — Stars, studs & duds: Celtics can’t score without Isaiah Thomas

On page 2, what do refs think of Marcus Smart?

With 3:55 to play in the second quarter, the officials had originally called a foul on Marcus Smart which he verbally protested that eventually led to him being whistled for a technical foul. 

After the officials reviewed the play, they changed the call to a personal foul against Khris Middleton but no change to the called technical foul against Smart who objected to a call that, upon review, they agreed was the wrong call to make. 

Official Sean Corbin, through pool reporter Ken Powtak of the Associated Press, acknowledged that the original call was a loose ball foul against Smart. 

“The (officiating) crew got together, we met prior to video and we decided that we needed to look at video because both players were on the floor bleeding so we went to the video for a hostile act,” Corbin told Powtak. “In the review we noticed that Khris Middleton initially made contact to Marcus Smart’s face. That’s how the original contact to the play occurred.”

CSNNE — Marcus Smart at center of yet another controversial call

Smart was involved in another call later in the game, where he tried to trip was just trying to make sure that Giannis’ shoe was on correctly, but let’s look at this first call, where Smart and Khris Middleton* both went flying into each other, and Smart was initially whistled for the foul.

Marcus Smart has a few reputations that follow him onto the court each night, and while each are not equal in weight, they all come together and influence the way refs treat him. First there’s the “temper” issue, which followed Smart from college. Smart publicly took his aggression out on a chair on the bench during his sophomore season and then got into it with an a$$hole fan who made racially insensitive comments to Smart. Marcus has kept his cool in most situations in the NBA, channeling it into tenacious defense and effort-based plays on both ends of the court, but it would be naive to think refs don’t have that in the back of their heads.

The second is Smart the flopper. Marcus has a reputation for acting as though he’s been uppercut by Mike Tyson after drawing contact. Smart’s play actually leads to him getting hit, legitimately, but refs don’t always give him the benefit of the doubt here.

The third rep is that of an absolute pitbull of a player. Smart is in on every hustle play, every rebound with bodies flailing, every loose ball. This leads to inadvertent contact and whistles by refs during which they aren’t exactly sure what they’re going to call until the dust settles. Those first two reputations unfortunately influence a referee’s call on one of those toss-up plays during which Smart is almost always involved.

Marcus should not have been T’d up last night (except for the Giannis play where the refs kept him in the game by calling a flagrant?!?!) because it was complete BS that he was immediately called for the foul on Middleton. If the refs felt the need to review it, they should have called a double foul until they could see it all unfold more slowly.

I bring all of this up because the intensity of both Smart and of the overall game is going to increase in a few weeks. The Celtics need Smart and they need him at all times to be successful, especially given the bench struggles evident last night. Marcus will need to remember to keep his cool — the Giannis scuffle wasn’t a big deal, but it was borne out of frustration and with the benefit of replay, any little thing could cost Smart some time, or the Celtics some points– and refs will need to withhold judgement and realize that Smart is simply a player in the mold of Tony Allen and Kawhi Leonard– a beast of a defender. Smart and the Celtics can only control the former and hope for the latter.

*Oh, right, Middleton, I wish we had him. Love watching him playing and hate watching him torch the Celtics with his length and ability to knock down threes.

And finally, high praise from the Cs for Malcolm Brogdon

“He’s not a rookie,” Stevens said after Brogdon scored six of his 16 points in the final quarter, including a huge jumper over Avery Bradley with 3.9 seconds left. “And I say that with complete respect to him. Like that guy, he knows how to play. He’s known how to play for a long time. He was a tremendous college player who was an ultimate winner and he’s just picked right up where he left off.”

“[Brogdon] made a few plays down the stretch that were big for them,” Thomas said. “That [last] shot, I don’t even think he thought it was going in. We played pretty good defense and it was a shot he had to shoot, so you’ve got to give credit to him and the Bucks.”

“That’s a tough [last] shot; Avery was all over him,” Boston forward Jae Crowder said. “It was very unfortunate, but [Brogdon] had got downhill a few times before, got a little confident, and made a tough shot.

“I think [Brogdon is] special. He’s a good player. He’s got great size on him, he’s very smart, and very savvy.”

ESPN Boston — Precocious rookie Malcolm Brogdon leads Bucks past Celtics

There were plenty of ways the Celtics could have and should have salted away the Bucks last night. Jae Crowder and Avery Bradley missed plenty of open looks (a combined 1-12 from deep) and Kelly Olynyk was abducted by aliens and didn’t play. But down the stretch, all one could do was give a hat tip to the 2nd round rookie, Malcolm Brogdon.

I haven’t watched too many Bucks games, save for any national TV Giannis games that come up on the schedule, so allow me to eat some crow for thinking, from afar, that Brogdon was putting up empty numbers. Those were anything but empty last night. If the Cs do see the Bucks again, I wouldn’t count on a series of that from Brogdon, but there’s no doubt he’s a player.