Mitchell Robinson says he ‘played like trash’ in his Celtics debut, and Joe Mazzulla says his center is ‘at the nucleus’ before the Knicks

Mitchell Robinson did not wait for anyone else to grade his Celtics debut. Two days after Boston blew a 22-point lead and lost its opener 121-113 in Detroit, the new center stood in front of reporters at Thursday’s practice and put it on himself. “I just felt like I was playing trash the whole time,” Robinson said. “It’s my fault. I gotta accept that.”

Robinson had 4 points, 3 rebounds and 2 blocks in 18 minutes on Tuesday and hurt his ankle along the way. He waved that off. “You’re going to feel it a little bit here and there, but, you know, shit happens,” he said. Asked what went wrong after halftime, when the Pistons won the second half 76-55 behind a 23-0 run, he said Boston had to “keep our foot on the gas, and it starts with me. I’m obviously one of the best defensive bigs in this league, and I didn’t show it that night.”

His next chance comes against the only team he had ever played for. Boston hosts the Knicks on Friday in its home opener, and Robinson, who won the title in New York in June and left for a three-year, $47.4 million deal in July, said the opponent was not the point. “I’m just here to play basketball,” he said, “the same thing I do with any other team.”

Mazzulla: the center is ‘at the nucleus’

Joe Mazzulla had not heard how hard Robinson had been on himself. “Mitch was? I didn’t know that,” he said when it was put to him. But he said the bar for Robinson is set high on purpose. “For us, he’s a very important piece to what we do,” Mazzulla said. “The standard is a little bit higher and the expectation is a little bit higher.” He added that it “comes with time, understanding that every play, you’re at the nucleus of what we’re trying to accomplish on both ends of the floor.”

Mitchell Robinson was pretty hard on himself after the Celtics’ season opener. It’s clear that frustration is fueling him entering tomorrow’s game against the Knicks.

I asked Joe Mazzulla about his points of emphasis to Robinson going over the film from Tuesday:

“I think he’s… https://t.co/GP1RQNjbq6 pic.twitter.com/YEKesKDPsp

— Bobby Krivitsky (@BobbyKrivitsky) October 22, 2026

Mazzulla has said this season that center may be the most important position on his team, and he stood by it after a night when Jalen Duren had 22 points and 9 rebounds for Detroit and Boston got into foul trouble. The center is “involved in every single pick-and-roll on the defensive end,” he said, from communicating the coverage to “the physicality at the rim on both sides of the floor, the rim protection.” On offense, “they’re involved in a ton of our actions.” He said it was not all on Robinson, Neemias Queta and the other bigs, “but it starts with them because of how good and impactful they can be. They know that.”

Robinson said Mazzulla texted him after the loss, and that he never answered the last one. “He talks me through a lot of things, especially that night,” Robinson said. “I appreciate it, but I didn’t even respond to the last text. I’m still stuck in my head about it.” He repeated that he had played badly: “I can’t have that.” He said the trust from his coach was “great, it’s awesome, but I still gotta do better.”

‘38 of that, and 10 minutes that we didn’t’

Mazzulla did not treat the collapse as a crisis. He said he told the team that “out of a 48-minute game, we probably played really good process basketball on both ends of the floor for 38 of that, and for 10 minutes that we didn’t.” The goal, he said, is to judge games the same way whether Boston wins or loses. “There’s going to be times where we win a game and we play worse than we did last night,” he said. “We just can’t be distracted by the result.”

He was specific about what cannot repeat, starting with fouling three-point shooters. “Those things can’t happen,” he said. Robinson, asked what the Celtics still have to learn about each other, called it “game one out of 81 now. We got a lot of room to grow and learn each other, but obviously it’s better to do it sooner than later.”

Mazzulla also pushed back on calling a blown lead adversity. “Adversity is a word that kind of just gets thrown around,” he said. “There’s a lot of other things that are much more adverse and important. What we’re going through are just things that we have to clean up on the basketball court. It’s not necessarily adversity. It’s just a challenge. It’s an opportunity.”

Paul Pierce at practice, and a word for Bob Huggins

Paul Pierce was in the gym on Thursday, and Mazzulla said that kind of visit is always welcome. “The door’s open for any Celtic,” he said. “It’s great to have him around,” both for individual conversations and as “one of the best players to play for the Celtics. I’m just grateful that he’s here and open for anyone to pick his brain.”

Mazzulla was also asked about Bob Huggins, who coached him at West Virginia and goes into a Hall of Fame in Cincinnati this week after his family shared that he is living with a progressive cognitive condition. Mazzulla said he had only just seen the news and would reach out in the next day or two. “He’s one of the guys that showed me the ropes on what it means to be an impactful coach,” he said. “He gave it everything he had and he left everything on the floor for his players, his staff, for the community. My life’s forever changed because of him, and I’m just very grateful.”

The Knicks are coming for Robinson, too

New York knows exactly what Robinson can do. Mike Brown said on Thursday that the Knicks have to be early in pick-and-roll coverage because “if he’s not the best vertical threat in the league, he’s one of them, top three. Anything you throw up, he’s going to catch on that backside and dunk it.” On the glass, Brown said, “it’s not just that one guy’s responsibility to box him out. We have to have multiple guys try to gang rebound.”

Brown said it would be good to see Robinson, given “the type of person he is and what we all went through together last year.” “But at the end of the day,” he said, “we want to kick his ass, like he probably wants to kick ours.”

Both teams are 0-1. The Knicks lost 106-100 to Philadelphia on ring night, and Boston is still without Devin Carter, who has mononucleosis. Tip-off at TD Garden is 7 p.m. ET on Friday, which is 2 a.m. Saturday in Cairo.