Jimmy Butler figures that things “could be a lot worse” after the Sixers fell 111-102 in Game 1 of their first-round playoff matchup with the underdog Brooklyn Nets.
“We could be down 0-4, but we’re not,” Butler told reporters in the lead-up to Game 2.
The 29-year-old finished with 36 points and nine rebounds in the series opener.
Per ESPN:
“We’re fortunate,” Butler said, even though his No. 3-seeded Sixers dropped the series opener to the No. 6-seeded Nets 111-102 on Saturday. “We get to play basketball every day. We’re in the playoffs. We’re the 3-seed. We’re happy. It could be a lot worse. We could be down 0-4, but we’re not.
“So we’re not going to worry about it, man. We’re going into this bad baby [Monday] thinking we’re going to win.”
[Brett] Brown said being down 0-1 is a fact of life sometimes in the postseason, citing that Denver and Toronto were also upset Saturday. It’s just about finding a way to be the first team to four wins and moving on, he said.
“Nobody accepts what happened yesterday,” he said. “You look around the league, three scalps were had by visiting teams. And it’s just part of, ‘How do you win four games?’ And so much of it for me over the years is, ‘How do you have that psychological stability where you don’t overreact?’ Where you’re at peace in some place within yourself, where you’re solid and steady, and you’re not up and down all the time and the playoffs can trick you.
“Family’s in town. The media is out at its pinnacle. And you have to ignore the noise. You really have to live in a place that is not distracting.”
