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Celtics out-hustle Hawks in 106-93 victory

CSNE

A. SHERROD BLAKLEY


BOSTON – After seeing Atlanta trail by 34 points earlier this season and nearly coming back to win, the Boston Celtics knew their double-digit lead going into the fourth quarter would be challenged.

As expected, the Hawks made a run and were within three with more than three minutes to play.

Rather than fold, the Celtics (4-4) began to flourish when it mattered most, as they surged ahead for a 106-93 win.

Following a lay-up by Kent Bazemore that cut Boston’s lead to 96-93, the Celtics scored 10 straight with the last five points coming from Jae Crowder.

Atlanta called a time-out with 1:05 to play, but it didn’t matter.

The Celtics had too much momentum, too much control and had played too hard to let this game get away from them.

Jared Sullinger continued his strong play for the Celtics with a third straight double-double (10 points, 10 rebounds).

Amir Johnson had a season-high 17 points to go with eight rebounds.

And as usual, the Celtics were led in scoring by Isaiah Thomas who finished with a game-high 23 points.

The Hawks, suffering their first road loss of the season, got 14 points and eight rebounds from Paul Millsap. Atlanta center Al Horford (13 points, six rebounds, eight assists) had a solid game as well.

But the Celtics were able to hold their own with the Hawks most of the game.

And down the stretch, they simply did a better job of executing at both ends of the floor while not making the kind of costly turnovers that the Hawks have feasted off opponents committing this season.

Boston had 10 turnovers, but only two in the fourth quarter. And those two turnovers only amounted to three points for the Hawks (8-3).

It was the kind of win that always comes at a good time. But it probably has even more significance for the Celtics as they hit the road this weekend and face the Oklahoma City Thunder, a team that, like the Hawks, are one of the better teams in the NBA.
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STUDS AND DUDS: AMIR JOHNSON, CELTICS SOAR PAST HAWKS

WEEI

By Josue Pavon



The Celtics‘ interior defense and second-half scoring outlasted the Hawks in a 106-93 victory at TD Garden.

The C’s closed the half on a 7-2 run, tying the game at 47, and then limited the Hawks from getting into the paint, where they did most of their damage in the first half. That opened their biggest lead, a 12-point advantage, in the third quarter.

The Celtics forced 16 Hawks turnovers and sparked their offense in the fourth quarter. Boston scored 61 second-half points and ran away with the win in the fourth quarter. Isaiah Thomas led the C’s with 23 points and 10 assists. Amir Johnson (19 points), Kelly Olynyk (15 points), Jae Crowder (13 points) and Jared Sullinger (10 points, 10 rebounds) also reached double figures.

Paul Millsap’s 14 points and eight rebounds led six Hawks in double figures, but it wasn’t enough to counter the Celtics‘ second-half scoring outburst.

STUD OF THE NIGHT: Amir Johnson.

Johnson got things going on the Hawks’ first possession, blocking Al Horford’s shot and sparking the Celtics’ offense. Johnson amassed eight rebounds, four assists, three blocks and three steals to go with his season-high 19 points. He also played phenomenal interior defense against Atlanta, limiting them from entering the paint.


DUD OF THE NIGHT: Jeff Teague.

Teague had a tough time finding his offensive rhythm against the Celtics. He scored six points on 2-of-6 shooting. The C’s did a good job limiting his drives to the hoop.

VINE OF THE NIGHT: Three passes. No dribble.


WHINE OF THE NIGHT: Marcus Smart’s health.

Smart had another subpar night after returning from his sprained big toe. He looks far from 100 percent, struggling on assignments defensively against Kyle Korver and Kent Bazemore. Offensively, he wasn’t moving the ball like he usually does. Brad Stevens may have jumped the gun inserting Smart into the starting lineup and playing him more than 30 minutes.

STAT OF THE NIGHT: Team rebounding.

The Celtics out-rebounded the Hawks by a significant margin (50-35). Sullinger grabbed a team-high 10 rebounds. Johnson and Crowder each added eight, and Evan Turner grabbed five off the bench.

112288

This game is a favorable matchup for the Celtics. I think the C's have more athleticism than Atlanta top to bottom and play a similar style.

-Atlanta turned the ball over 16 times, compared to just 10 for Boston.
-Atlanta was 6-20 (30%) from 3PT.
-Boston won the rebound battle 50-35.
-Boston also took 103 shots, compared to just 76 for Atlanta.



KJ

Hi,
Another good win against a good team.
I wonder what is it with the new journalistic fab: studs - duds, vine - whine?
Speaking about "whine" of Smart. Sure his shooting is very bad, but last night he did an excellent job defending Korver, even Mike and Tommy commented on it.
IT finally, in the 2nd half, found his shooting groove.
Overall, I think Celtics' defense is much better than their offense. It seems that they start a game totally cold: airball, rim, board - everything except the ball going through the net. I hope they'll "warm up" as the season progresses.

AK

Happy Friday the 13th.  It was for us.  So much for superstition.  Maybe the reason why it's bad luck for a black cat to cross your path is because you might get knocked down by the Rottweiler chasing it.

A rock'em, sock'em game with few fouls being called underneath.  A lot of good reasons for both sides to complain at one point and turn and jog down court so the refs can't see the big shit-eating grin on their faces at another.  32 total fouls called.  I took at look at the Orlando-Utah boxscore, just for comparison since they ended up with a similar 103-93 score, and they had 44 total fouls called.  A little thing, perhaps, but it's nice to know that when we're in a game where the refs swallow their whistles we can hold our own against a good team.

Speaking of complaining about calls or trying to keep the smirk off their faces, I had the Atlanta Hawks announcers last night.  Mike "Stinger" Glenn was sitting in for 'Nique.  I listen to the other teams' announcers all the time and these are are SO annoying.  Their in-studio crew is awful too.  They were SO smug and confident in their feeble little brains of beating us before the game.  "All we have to do is not turn the ball over and this should be an easy W", they actually said.  Well, guess what dimwits, Atlanta only had 16 TOs, which is less than the 17 TOs we are creating/game on average and you still lost.  Glenn talked about how Boston always complains about the refs in this building.  Right.  And you never complained about the calls in your unimpressive career.  You averaged 7.6 ppg, 1.6 assists and 1.7 TOs in your point guard career.  How'd you get the name "stinger"?  Did you sit on a bee?  Asshole.  Couldn't stop talking about the chowder, and how he couldn't believe RJ hasn't had any yet and how he's had 3 already and will have one more before he leaves.  Here, before you go, take this with you too (slap).

Hawks head coach Mike Budenholzer (gesundheit!) stayed in Atlanta attending to an unspecified family emergency.  Hope all works out.  Assistant coach Kenny Atkinson ran the show last night.

We hung in there in the first, ending up down by only 3.  Really quite amazing considering they shot 55% and we only shot 33%.  The big difference is that we had 27fgas vs their 20.  The upside of uptempo basketball.  When you're hitting, you're unstoppable and when you're cold, like we were, you can hang in there until you warm up.  Our 3pt shooting in the first was both prolific and horrific.  9 of our 27 fgas were 3s and we hit only 2 of them.  2-9.  Yuck.  Just imagine how good a team we'll be when Danny gets us some players who can and should actually be shooting them.  

I have to say, we have a team of terrible finishers.  We shoot a lot, from all over the floor, we just don't have players who put the ball in the hoop.  Smart, Crowder, Bradley from anywhere inside 10-12''.  That's 3 of our starters right there.  When you hear, or think, the words "blowing bunnies" or "got swallowed up" or "what the Hell was that?" a lot you know you have problems finishing.  It seems like I hear those words so often they're practically a mantra.

Tied at 45-45 at halftime, we came out after halftime and put them in a nice hole with a 35-24 quarter.  It was a two possession game, 64-60, with 4:00 left in the 3rd and then Kelly blocked Millsap's shot and we went on a 16-9 run to end that quarter.  I LOVE it when we finish quarters strong.  That's Championship ball.  That's how Champions play.  You know time is running down and you focus and bear down and bury the other team until the buzzer goes off.


1.  Millsap came out strong and dominated Sully.  10 points on 4-5 in the 1st quarter.  Sully didn't box him out, 2 points.  Same way as against Lavoy Allen and Indy.  The boy has the butt for it, he needs to use it more.  As tough as Millsap was in the 1st, he was invisible in the 2nd.  No points nor rebounds in the 2nd quarter.  In the 2nd half he totaled 4 points and 6 rebounds to end the game with a nice, but contained, 14 points and 8 rebounds.  He also had 6 TOs, with 5 of them coming in the 3rd quarter.

2.  The exceedingly dangerous Kyle Korver only had 11 points on 4-6, 3-5 from 3.  We've all seen what he's like when he starts to feel he is in a shooting rhythm, you do not want to be on the receiving end of that!  Why didn't he go off on us last night?  Marcus Smart.  Smart was in his shirt all night.  He had zero fgas in the 1st quarter because Smart was glued to him.  He had 3 points on 1-2 at halftime, because Smart was glued to him.  He'd get the ball and before he could even turn Smart was already all over him like a cheap suit.  He started to hit in the 3rd, going 3-3, but those buckets came when Turner was guarding him.  It wasn't so much that Turner was playing poor defense, he actually was doing ok, it's just that you cannot give Korver any daylight at all, you cannot let him get off one shot that goes in and makes him feel good because once that happens the flood gates open and you could get swamped in 3s.  Smart did one of the best jobs of shutting Kyle Korver down I've seen in a while.  When an ATO play by Atlanta is for the pass to go to Korver at the frito line and then immediately pass to Splitter slashing down from the 3pt line weakside and not even look at the hoop first, you know you've done a good job of making the opposing coach re-think how he gets buckets scored and when that re-thinking involves turning one of the best shooters in the league into a decoy, well, good job.  Offensively, Smart is a mediocre point guard/floor general and a brickmeister supreme.  2-10, 1-5 from 3 with damn few even looking remotely close to having a chance of going in.  When he goes inside he's more effective but even then he has no deceptiveness.  You may be built like a brick shithouse, Marcus, but when you're surrounded by 6'10" - 6'11" Al Horford and Tiago Splitter, you have to get a little clever.  He doesn't have much touch.   There are those who believe that point guards can be taught, groomed, developed and then there is the school that thinks you are either born with it or you aren't.  I fall into the latter category and I use Avery Bradley as my poster boy.  If former NBA All-Star point guard Doc Rivers and uber-teacher Brad Stevens cannot build him into a point guard, it cannot be done.  I am having serious doubts about Smart's "born with it" talents.  Shooting, on the other hand, is definitely teachable.  Don "Duck" Chaney, Jason Kidd, Magic Johnson; there are lots of examples of non-shooters who became at least tolerable shooters with tons of practice and coaching over time.  I think a shooting coach needs to break Smart's shot mechanics down and rebuild them.  It would be the best summertime investment he can or will ever make.

3.  Another game of watching Kelly carefully.  I'm starting to really come around on his defense.  He played good defense on Millsap down low, really putting his body right up on him and almost forcing him to take an off balance fallaway (which did not go in).  He stepped out on some help defense and was able to get back and reach down and get a hand on a bounce pass to and opportunistic and cutting Splitter underneath to knock it out of bounds.  He got lucky on one play.  Bazemore was able to slither past him baseline and tossed up a flip shot underneath that didn't go in.  Lucky because Kelly didn't have his hands up.  Nevertheless, good defense overall by Kelly.  Not a shot blocker, but he has learned his role in the defensive schemes well.  Offensively, he came in very confident.  On one of the first possessions he touched the ball he came around off a pick out high and turned for a no-hesitation 3.  That's what he needs to do, just shoot it.  I prefer players to get their first buckets inside, to get their confidence up with an easy fgm or two, but this happened in the part of the game when all we were doing was taking 3s.  Fortunately, Kelly hit his first one or who knows?  He looked pretty smooth though.  15 points on 6-13 and 3-6 from 3 for Kelly in only 17 minutes.  We shot 11-33 as a team from 3, so 3-6 really pulls that number up.  He also had 2 blocks, one on Paul Millsap and the other on Dennis Schroder, both in that great 3rd quarter where we put some space between us.  For those keeping count, that's as many blocks as starting center Al Horford had in 32 minutes and as many as the entire Atlanta Hawks team had.  That's right, they only had Horford's two blocks total.  That's how you win games.  Yeah, I know he's not a particularly good rebounder.  Ok, he just isn't a good rebounder, period, but he's doing a lot of other things that are good.

4.  Sully started off in Millsap's torture chamber but came storming back in the 2nd half.  Where Kelly is all about position and finesse Sully is just pure muscle.  He had a wrestling move where he earned a jump ball that took him and 6'11" Mike Muscala to the floor out of bounds.  Muscala rolled over and looked at the ref as if to say "are you allowed to do that in basketball?".  In this game you were because the refs decided in the locker room before tip off this was going to be a man's game tonight.  He got another Tommy point making a laid-out flat dive for a loose ball in absolute Worm-like fashion.  His foot was out of bounds, so he didn't save it, but man oh man is Sully giving the body up now.  10 points on 5-11 and 10 rebounds in 24 minutes and, happily, only one 3pt fga.

5.  Isaiah Thomas is an E-ticket.  For those who are not familiar with that expression, that is the top, most exciting rides at Disneyland.  0-3 and just 1ftm after 1, 6 points on 2-6 and 1-3 from 3, 3 assists and a 1 TO at halftime.  I'm thinking "please get well soon, Avery, so we can send Mighty Mite back to the bench".  Then, we started the 3rd.  After 3 he had 17 points on 6-15, 6 assists and still only 1 TO.  That's an 11 point quarter shooting 4-9 and 3 assists and zero TOs.  When he's on, man, he's on and the opposing coach and players have their heads on swivels trying to keep track of where the Hell he is.  Mahcus Smaht needs to watch him too, carefully.  Learn his craftiness, Mahcus, learn his craftiness but please don't learn how to misplace your conscience like him.  Obviously, Thomas has a pure shooter's mentality, where he is thinking he has never seen a shot he hasn't liked and always thinks that no how many he has missed or how badly he missed them, the next one is nothing but net.  23 points, 10 assists and only 2 TOs in 34 minutes with most of it coming in the 2nd half.  What's amazing here is that only 3 of those points were from the frito line.  I would have sworn that, in a game where you need to be carried off on a stretcher before the refs will blow a whistle, IT's game would suffer.  Not so.  As Hunter S. Thompson once famously said "you buy the ticket, you take the ride".  In Isaiah Thomas's amusement park, it's an E-ticket.

6.  Jae Crowder needs to stop taking 3s.  That's #1.  My God is he ever a bad finisher!  I'll give him credit for hitting a very big, very clutch 2 pter at the end to ice the game and give IT his 10th assist, but otherwise he was awful offensively.  He had a tip in, that's nice but, to put it gently, he should not be shooting on the move.  He can catch and shoot.  Sometimes.  Another 5-14 night for Jae with an abysmal 1-5 from 3.  At this point I cringe when I see Jae Crowder gathering himself for a shot.  Defensively, he's a middle linebacker.  He's a wrecking ball.  The league leader in steals season-to-date is probably not surrendering his pole position after another ho-hum 4 steal night.  8 boards, 6 offensive.  You have to love that kind of aggressive mindset that gets you that many rebounds from your wing with more offensive boards than defensive ones.  I positively adore offensive rebounding, so this makes me feel very good.  Not enough to make me feel guilty about citing his contributions to masonry at the top, but still pretty freaking good.  Even Mike Glenn mentioned his disruptive presence on defense (he didn't say anything about Smart's on Korver.  He got a little happy when Korver hit a few but missed that those were with Turner on Korver.  Then again, Mike Glenn is a putz).  

7.  Who kept us in that first quarter, when they were hitting 55% and we ice cold?  Amir Johnson.  He started out the game with a point blank block on Horford, then he hit a 3 and then he fakes the shot, puts it on the floor and gets fouled rumbling to the rim.  Amir has been struggling lately, I understand he sprained his ankle a week back or so, but he came out smokin' last night.  3 blocks on the night, more than the entire Hawks team combined.  Even more than Kelly!  (that was for you, Cowens).  We have so much depth in the front court and the difference between Amir healthy and limping is huge, why not just let him sit out a game or two to come back to 100% like you're doing with Bradley, Brad, and let Mickey get a few reps?  It'll be good for Mickey, who has shown he can be effective in the very limited garbage time minutes he has played so far, and it will be very good for Amir's game.  I don't think we'll lose too much on defense with Mickey.

8.  RJ Sniper came in and almost immediately dropped a howitzer shell from Cambridge on the Hawks.  Then, strangely, he had a wide open corner 3 and passed it up, instead taking it baseline for a closer shot.  Welcome to the NBA, rook.  The people here are really, really big.  Remember what I said about  "getting swallowed up"?  Brad is becoming more comfortable putting RJ in, and that's good, but I think Brad should run more plays for RJ and not just let him create.  He is, still, after all, just a new rookie.  Coming off of pin downs, though?  I think RJ would shine brightly in that role.

9.  Evan Turner with a 2-11 performance.  We need another point guard.  I'm not knocking Turner, he has had some excellent games for us but we need another ball handler.  If Rozier isn't ready, and against a very tough opponent Rozier never got off the bench, then we need a veteran.  Turner is a bit of a trick-or-treater too.

10.  Zeller got off the bench and was pretty effective and efficient in his 6 minutes.  I'm not sure why Brad bothered putting him in for only 6 total minutes but at this point Zeller is probably happy just pulling his warm ups off.  David Lee with 12 minutes.  Lee got stuffed, royally, and Brad probably just thought "ok, not good matchups here" and pulled him.  If there's any consolation in that for Lee it's that Jerebko only played 12 too and Jonas usually gets more.

11.  A nice game coaching by Brad after what were, in my opinion, a couple of stinkers.  He had a very nice ATO where Jerebko was in the corner weak side and Kelly was in the low blocks weak side.  Once the count started, Kelly took a step out to set the back pick on Jerebko's man as Jonas cut from the corner over the top of the back pick and slashed to the hoop, getting behind Kelly's man quickly.  The inbound pass from the other side as he cleared the pick and hit him under the basket.  He was fouled from behind by Kelly's man for a trip to the line.  A well designed play, a well executed back pick by Kelly and slash by Jerebko, excellent timing on their two moves.  Kelly setting a solid pick Jerebko's man couldn't easily get past and Jerebko not moving too soon so Kelly doesn't have the chance to set a non-moving pick, but not waiting so long his man can feel the pick and adjust nor so long Kelly's man can also adjust for the incoming slasher.  That's the kind of stuff other players notice and respect.  It isn't just "give it to the stud and let him work" It's clever, it's inclusive and, last but not least, it's effective.  

12.  Stat roundup:  They shot 47% on the night.  NOT good.  They only took 76 fgas and, for us, that's very good.  Considering they only turned the ball over 16 times, that is just good, throttling defense by us.  They only had 4 fast break points, more evidence of just slowing them down into a half court offense team that is shooting in the latter half of the shot clock.  We, on the other hand, had a splendiforous (credit to Walt "Clyde" Frazier) 103 fgas.  I had the Hawk feed, so I don't know if Tommy was doing the color at the game but I'm sure he was very, very happy with that.  Considering our Corps of Masons only hit 41%, it's a good thing we got that many.  We had 50 points in the paint vs 48 for them.  So, all the harsh statements about the mediocrity of our front court and we still scored more in the paint than a team with good front court players in Horford, Splitter and Millsap and who run an excellent, excellent motion offense.  Mike "Stinker" Glenn talked about how many 3s we took.  Yeah, but we ended up 11-33 for 33% while Atlanta was 6-20 for 30%.  We took more AND shot them better.  Watching the game, though, I have to admit I was cringing at all the 3s.  It was the 3rd quarter that dragged our numbers up.  10 steals for us vs 3 for them, all of our by our starters.  That's nice, I like seeing our starters out playing our bench AND their starters.  What's impressive is that 10 steals is below our league leading average of 11.3.  What's also impressive is that Atlanta is right behind us at 10.2/game and they only had 3 against us.  Here's a shock:  We are 22nd in blocks against.  We are blocking more shots than shots getting blocked.  Who'da thunk that?


A big damn victory for us.  The Atlanta Hawks are a good, good team, coming in last night with an 8-2 record.  They play a very Spurs-like offense, like what Brad wants us to play, and they executed quite well last night as their 47% fg% proves.  We had some nice runs and were up by 15 points with 10 minutes left and they made a nice 12-0 run to cut it to 3 with 6 1/2 left.  How many times, over the past few years, have we seen us implode in the 4th because we can't hold a lead?  I'm not going to lie, my Pucker Factor was approaching medically dangerous levels halfway through the 4th.  Another bucket or two by them and the pressure in my sphincter would have produced diamond cufflinks from lumps of coal in 3 weeks.  Then, Isaiah Happened.  3 straight 3s, a Sully 2 and a few more from Turner, Amir and a step up 2 by Jae and we break their backs by 11.  I loved that, even though the game was all but over, they couldn't even get a last, unimpactful fga because we stole the ball, dribbled it over the time line and ran out the clock.  A big win, against one of the class teams of the east and we did it after the loss against Indy.  Winning teams don't allow themselves to go on extended losing streaks, especially not at home.  We're learning how to close quarters and teams out, in this case a good team.  We're growing. We have holes in our roster, like a legit starting center and a veteran point guard, but we're still grinding out some victories as Brad's system continues to burn in.


bob


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