'Their best chance to win': Celtics open NBA finals at home

The Boston Celtics host the Dallas Mavericks at the TD Garden Thursday night in the first game of the NBA Finals.

Boston is favored to win, and start the finals with the home court advantage.

For a preview of the championship series, WBUR's Morning Edition host Rupa Shenoy spoke with Boston Globe basketball reporter Gary Washburn.

Highlights from this interview have been lightly edited for clarity.

On key players to watch"

"It's going to be a star-studded series. The Dallas Mavericks have two stars that are very well-known — Luka Dončić,  a 25-year-old standout from Slovenia, who is one of the best players in the league and also Kyrie Irving, the former Celtic who has resurrected his career in Dallas — in addition to the [Celtics] superstars, Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum."

On whether Tatum and Brown will be able to deliver:

"I'm expecting for them to give their absolute best effort. This is their best chance to win a championship in the seven years they've been together. They're favored in this series and they'll have to play their best basketball, so they'll have to play better than they played throughout the playoffs. And they played well throughout the playoffs. So they're going to need everything that's in them to win this series. And I think they have enough talent to do it. It's going to be a very competitive series because Dallas is also a very good team."

On Joe Mazzulla's first finals as coach:

"He is going to implement whatever game plan he can to slow down Luka Dončić. He's the head of the snake. He's their best player. He is the reason that they're here. And so he has to implement defenses to slow him down. And he also has to make Luca play on both sides of the ball, which means play defense and exert effort and energy there too.

"So his plan should be to try to slow down the combination of Dončić and Kyrie Irving. You're not going to stop them, they're too talented, but you want to slow them down and make them less efficient."

On what makes this series different than the Celtics' 2022 finals loss against Golden State:

"They have the additions of Jrue Holiday, who was an NBA champion three years ago, then with the Milwaukee Bucks. And Kristaps Porziņģis is a center who kind of unlocks their offense because he's so versatile. And I just think experience also helps.

"This team had a chance to win that championship two years ago and kind of fell apart at a key stretch, and Golden State was much more experienced. They had won three previous championships and they did not panic when the Celtics seemingly panicked. So I think experience will make a difference here.

"The Celtics have been here before. They know the routine, so they should be more familiar with the process than the Mavericks, most of whom have not played NBA Finals."

On former Celtics player Kyrie Irving's tension with Boston fans:

"I don't think it'll be a factor in the game. I think the crowd will get into it. I think they'll try to get into his head, the Boston fans, in terms of the chanting and trying to distract him a little bit. He did not have a smooth tenure in Boston. He had a very tumultuous time here. He made some promises that he didn't live up to. So the Boston fans will remember that and it will remind them of that."

On whether the team has shown they can bring home a victory:

"Yeah, they've lived up to everything so far. They've checked all the boxes. They had the best record in the NBA, they are 12-2 in the playoffs so far, No. 1 seed. So they're here and now it's time to really, really step your game up and make sure that you take home the banner because they are their favorite and the pressure is on them."