Jaylen Brown stares straight ahead, at nothing in particular in the Auerbach Center. His look is determined, as always, broken suddenly by a slight smile.

He thinks back on the year, and the immense changes that rocked the young starters from last May’s Eastern Conference finalist, himself included.

Brown doesn’t believe he showed what he’s capable of this season. Just wait, he says.

“It’s not like I’m complaining about the cards I was given, and I’m really not. People might not have seen it this year,” he said. “But one of these years to come, somebody is going to get this wrath.”

Everyone dipped this year. Some starting jobs expired like temporary visas when Kyrie Irving and Gordon Hayward came back. Jayson Tatum, last year’s leading playoff scorer, has slumped his way through the past two months. Terry Rozier, who grew too attached to his starting, starring role in the playoffs, continues to struggle with the adjustment.

Brown’s return to the bench after starting 19 of the first 20 games was, for a time, a detour through disorienting territory. But of the three, he’s emerged in the best form thanks to a renewed commitment getting to the line, with the most explosive rise to the rim of anyone on this team and great potential as a shut-down defender to boot.

Though those changes initially put a damper on his Year 3 development, Brown believes the struggle made him a better player.

“I’ve gotten a lot better, to be honest, and I’m really appreciative of all the situations I’ve seen and gone through, because I’ve improved. People will see it soon,” he said. “Since the start of the year the challenges — I’m complaining about it, but it’s really made me better as a basketball player.

“It hasn’t been seen yet. I haven’t been able to show people how much better I’ve gotten from last year just because of situations, I really enhanced my game — my in-between game, my decision-making, my mindset before the game.”

Brown now hopes that the playoffs, once again, will be his greatest outlet.

Accountable to expectations

Some would say that the young guys, after so much playoff success, came back feeling a little too good about themselves. Though he regretted it days later, Irving publicly talked about his frustration with Celtics youth. Brown stood up for himself and the rest when he said the entire lineup — not just the young guys — was accountable.

Looking back to training camp, though, Brown admits that he underestimated the oncoming shift.

“I definitely did. A lot of people were guilty of it too — what to expect,” he said. “Things weren’t going to happen the way they were. It’s life. Everything doesn’t go the way you think it’s going to go. You have to be prepared for every scenario, and for me, I could have prepared myself more for, uh – but then again I haven’t seen, or been a part of a season like this, in terms of media expectations. It’s a learning process. I think I learned as the season went on — all of us have — and it’s definitely going to stay with us for the seasons to come.”

Brown anticipated a bigger role — something reflecting what he accomplished during the Celtics’ run to the Eastern Conference Finals. He couches this in terms of “responsibility.” He expected more.

“You come back and expect to be a focal point of things, being one game from the Finals, and that’s just not how the situation was drawn up, and respectfully so,” he said. “Brad has a lot on his plate. He asked a lot from his veteran players and we have to adjust along with that. Part of me being in the league for my third year is adjusting. I’m 22-years-old, I have a lot to learn, I don’t know it all, and I had to adjust a lot. That’s where the challenge for me took place, and I’m sure some of the other young guys. Those phases of adjustments.”

Brown had a punch list of improvements — be a better playmaker, attack with more confidence and get to the line, be more consistent, period, perhaps the greatest struggle of all in the face of reduced minutes.

Asked about Brown’s realization that he underestimated what was about to happen, Brad Stevens said, “That’s for everybody. One of the hardest things to do, is go from what people on the outside especially consider to be a bigger role, to playing less minutes and play them better, and I think he’s done that.

“I think he’s playing better now than he did in the playoffs last year,” said the Celtics coach. “We were not a perfect team during that run in the playoffs. We had a lot of errors and things we needed to clean up. So I’ve seen great improvement in Jaylen. And it’s probably been a great challenge for him. It’s gonna be tougher than your greatest experience.”

So should the young guys have done a better job of anticipating the oncoming disruption? Probably. But Stevens certainly saw it coming.

“Said it from the preseason. We saw how tough this was going to be right from the git-go,” said the Celtics coach. “You knew it was going to be that way — just part of it. At the end of the day we needed to make changes to even our rotations out a little bit, and get guys who complemented each other on the court together at different times to maximize the minutes.”

A high standard

Irving’s return was inevitably going to impact how the young guys played — curtail some of that freedom they enjoyed last spring Tatum, who thrived as the lead weapon, suddenly had to re-think where and when he was getting the ball.

“A lot. Everybody had to adjust, just trying to figure out what works best for us,” said Tatum. “But I wasn’t surprised. Part of the game.”

Though Brown admits to underestimating the change in his role, it wasn’t as if he forgot the realities of sharing the floor with Irving.

“In the playoffs it was different because we had so much responsibility, but it wasn’t too much of an adjustment because we knew how to play with Kyrie prior,” he said. “We played with him for 60 games. It wasn’t too much of an adjustment, but it was in terms of the thought that maybe our responsibility would go up a little more. It did in a sense, but it didn’t. When you expect more of yourself and you just have to keep working until you get there.”

Playing with Irving wasn’t going to even be Brown’s main concern, except during those nights when he was part of the finishing unit. Instead, with Hayward hitting stride at the perfect time, on the eve of the playoffs, Brown has developed some nice late-season chemistry with a player who, everything considered, is a new teammate.

“I thought one of the most encouraging things about the January to early February stretch was Terry/Jaylen/Gordon went from a numbers standpoint from right about even to way up,” Stevens said of what his metrics have shown. “That’s really encouraging, and it makes sense. But it took us awhile to figure out not only those guys playing together, because Gordon and Jaylen aren’t starting anymore, but also what to run so they best fit together.”

Both players are now exploding into the paint — Brown with a clearer view of his impact, and Hayward with renewed confidence after a long year coming back from traumatic injury.

And maybe now Brown can settle back into meeting that high standard envisioned for him — as a dangerous scorer gifted enough to also guard the opponent’s most dangerous scorer.

“It’s a high standard that is being held to. I appreciate that — a high standard,” said Brown. “But I want to show people that I’m better than they think. Hopefully in the playoffs I will get the opportunity to do so.”