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I was spending a week on Cape Cod when the Celtics traded for Kyrie Irving last August. Afterward, a friend said that I should enjoy those last few days of sun and surf because it might be a while before I could go back. With Irving and Gordon Hayward, the Celtics could play well into June.

It was a logical point. The team had added two All-Stars, along with the third overall pick of the draft, Jayson Tatum, and by wresting Irving from Cleveland, they’d even taken away LeBron James’s sidekick. So I dipped my fried scallops in some cocktail sauce and started preparing for what figured to be a long, yet invigorating, year ahead.

At a joint introductory news conference for Irving and Hayward, they both seemed to grasp what was being built in Boston. At one point, Irving turned to Hayward and smiled.

“It’s about to be crazy, G,’’ he said.

They were not thinking about late December games against the Orlando Magic. They were thinking about the end, and how magical it might eventually be.

But perhaps the only thing more surprising than how Boston’s frenetic summer unfolded was what followed. The Celtics will enter the playoffs in a few days without Hayward or Irving, who have both been lost to season-ending injuries.

A year that had been filled with hope and expectations now sits in a kind of basketball purgatory. The Celtics will still be the No. 2 seed in the Eastern Conference playoffs — an impressive feat even for a healthy team — and they still have enough talent to give any opponent fits.

But they are not what they could have been. And, really, that has been the case since October.

Less than six minutes into the season opener against the Cavaliers, Hayward leaped to corral an alley-oop pass from Irving and had a crushing landing, his broken left ankle snapping so gruesomely that it caused players to recoil, pray, or leave their bench. Hayward’s season was almost certainly over, and it was reasonable to believe that Boston’s was, too.

Except it wasn’t. The Celtics lost their next game before blasting opponents with a 16-game winning streak. Tatum and Jaylen Brown thrived in more prominent roles. Irving, who had been so disgruntled in Cleveland, finally looked happy again, and it showed with his selfless and inspired play.

Sure, there were nagging and even puzzling injuries to overcome, from Marcus Morris’s sore knee to Brown’s concussion to Marcus Smart’s hand laceration suffered when he punched a picture frame in his Los Angeles hotel room. But there was a sense that by the time the playoffs arrived, the Celtics would be all right.

Then in a game against the Pacers March 11, backup center Daniel Theis was lost for the season with a torn meniscus, and Smart tore a ligament in his right thumb, likely sidelining him through at least the first round of the playoffs.

Irving’s left knee had been bothering him for some time, with the Celtics insisting it was just tendinitis. But the soreness caused him to leave that game against Indiana at halftime, and he would not return again.

He had surgery March 24 to remove a tension wire that had been installed as part of a 2015 procedure to repair a broken kneecap, and there was quiet optimism that he would return near the start of the playoffs.

Less than a week later, though, a pathology test revealed bacteria on the tension wire, indicating the presence of an infection. Irving would need a second, more debilitating surgery in which screws from the 2015 procedure would be removed, ending his season and, perhaps, Boston’s.

Although Hayward’s absence was significant, the Celtics had proven that they could thrive without him. Irving’s departure felt like a knockout blow. But it might not flatten Boston, at least not right away.

It is no easy task to make up for Irving’s 24.4 points, 5.1 assists, and 3.8 rebounds per game, but the Celtics have shown that they will try their best. Including one game against the Hornets in which Irving played less than two minutes, Boston is 14-7 (66.6 winning percentage) without him, and 40-19 (67.8) with him.

Yes, the Celtics defeated some lowly opponents without Irving, but they’ve also toppled the Raptors (twice), Trail Blazers (twice), Thunder, and Jazz.

In Irving’s 1,931 minutes on the court, the Celtics had a net rating of 5.2, meaning they outscored opponents by an average of 5.2 points per 100 possessions. In 1,886 total minutes without him, the net rating dipped to 2.3. By comparison, the Celtics have a 6.9 net rating with Tatum on the court this season, and a -1.3 rating without him, a much wider gap.

In recent days, players have openly taken affront to the suggestion that they cannot win with their current roster of able bodies.

“This team, we’re resilient,’’ Morris said. “Everybody on this team is ready to compete. We all feel disrespected. Kyrie, Marcus, Theis — all those guys are major for our team. But they’re not here, so we still have to approach the game as if we’re going to win and get as far as we can.’’

The Celtics might still bow out in the opening round of the playoffs. But it would not be stunning to see them march into the Eastern Conference finals for the second consecutive year, either. They still have good players, they still play hard, and they still have Brad Stevens as their coach.

Also, it’s worth pointing out that this was never really supposed to be the Celtics’ year, anyway. Even with Hayward and Irving, even with Smart and Theis, they were not viewed as real threats against the Warriors or now the Rockets.

The flood of injuries will make it easy to wonder what could have been, because what’s the point of sports without what-could-have-beens? But in this case, there is still a future; there is still a what-will-be.

Hayward and Irving are expected to be fully recovered in time for training camp next fall, and by then, Tatum and Brown will be more prepared and powerful than they were at the start of this year. For the Celtics, perhaps it will just be a dream deferred. But do not tell them that, because this year’s team is not done dreaming just yet.

Adam Himmelsbach can be reached at adam.himmelsbach@ globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @adamhimmelsbach.