2016 NBA PLAYOFFS POST GAME ATLANTA - HOME GAME #3

STUDS AND DUDS: ISAIAH THOMAS (42 POINTS), JONAS JEREBKO KEY CELTICS’ GAME 3 WIN

WEEI

By Sam Packard

Celtics guard Isaiah Thomas (4) reacts after one of his many baskets against the Hawks in Game 3. (David Butler II/USA Today Sports)

From a Jonas Jerebko put-back dunk on the opening possession to three flagrant fouls, a lane violation to nullify a four-point play, Marcus Smart’s chase-down block of Al Horford and a 42-point night from Isaiah Thomas, Game 3 had it all.

More importantly, the Celtics survived Atlanta’s comeback efforts in a 111-103 victory.

All they have to do is press repeat on Sunday night at the Garden. Easier said than done, since Thomas played out of his mind and the C’s got A games from Evan Turner (17 points, 7 assists, 5 steals), Amir Johnson (15 points, 7 rebounds, 2 blocks), Jerebko (11 points, 12 rebounds, 4 assists) and Smart (11 points, 5 assists, 3 rebounds, 2 blocks).

For the complete box score, click here. To go beyond the box, read on.


STUD OF THE NIGHT: Isaiah Thomas.

After a disappointing end to the season and an underwhelming first two games of the series, Thomas was the best player on the floor Friday night. He played off the ball as more of a shooting guard and flourished. Thomas was money from beyond the arc, knocking down five of his 12 attempts from deep. With just under two minutes left to play, Thomas launched an absolute dagger from approximately 28 feet. Thomas did a fantastic job of attacking the basket, making 13 of his 15 free throws. He also may have accidentally punched Schroder in the face, so hopefully he is still active for Game 4.

DUD OF THE NIGHT: Jae Crowder.

Crowder is giving everything he’s got, but clearly his shot is not falling. He finished 1-for-11 from the field for only four points. With that being said, he played excellent defense on the Hawks bigs, who only combined for 16 points. Crowder took another fall late in the fourth quarter and was slow to get up. It will be interesting to see how much Stevens relies on him in Game 4 on Sunday.


WHINE OF THE NIGHT: No Prince music.

The Celtics’ game operations staff must not have two ears nor souls. How do you not play one Prince song? Let’s Go Crazy is literally what you want the fans to do. Such an outrageous oversight.

STAT OF THE NIGHT: 9-of-36.

The Hawks shot only 25 percent from 3-point range on Friday night. Kyle Korver made five of those 3’s, while the rest of the team was just dreadful.
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Isaiah Thomas scores 42 as Celtics close to 2-1 in series vs. Hawks

ESPNBOSTON

BOSTON -- Isaiah Thomas scored a career-high 42 points, and the Boston Celtics held on to beat the Atlanta Hawks 111-103 on Friday night in Game 3 of the Eastern Conference first-round series.

Evan Turner, inserted into the starting lineup, had 17 points and seven assists. Amir Johnson added 15 points and seven rebounds as the Celtics closed to 2-1 in the best-of-seven series.

Playing by far their best first half of the series, Boston led by as many as 20 points before seeing that mostly erased by a 12-0 run by the Hawks in the third quarter.

The Celtics then survived a frenetic fourth quarter that featured three ties and a pair of lead changes, finally getting separation with five straight points for a 104-98 lead.

Jeff Teague had 23 points for Atlanta. Kent Bazemore and Dennis Schroder each finished with 20.

Game 4 is Sunday in Boston.

In an effort to find some early energy following lethargic opening quarters in both Game 1 and 2, Celtics coach Brad Stevens tweaked his lineup Friday.

He started Turner in place of Marcus Smart, and Jonas Jerebko got the nod over Jared Sullinger.

It meant the Celtics were a much smaller team, but it also translated into a group that was a lot quicker and active in transition.

That showed early with the first points of the game coming via Jerebko on a tip-dunk off Thomas' missed layup. Boston used the jolt to build its double-digit first-half lead.

The Hawks whittled away at it with a balanced attack, but still shot just 12 percent from the 3-point line in the opening 24 minutes.

Along with the quickened offensive pace, tempers were tweaked times.

Most notably, Thomas and Schroder were issued double technical fouls following a brief face-to-face moment. Thomas had to be restrained by Sullinger.

Sullinger was called for a flagrant foul on Schroder later in the period. That was almost immediately followed by a flagrant foul on the other end by Paul Millsap on Sullinger.

Then, early in the fourth quarter, Schroder was issued a flagrant for a foul on Thomas.

TIP-INS

Hawks: Schroder had his highest-scoring playoff game. ... Atlanta was just 2 for 17 from the 3-point line in the first half.

Celtics: Boston's 57 points in the first half total eclipsed their first-half totals for both Game 1 (34) and Game 2 (28).
112288

BRAD'S FIRST PLAYOFF WIN!

LITTLE HOME COOK'IN DOES THE TRICK EVERY TIME!

112288

Absolutely incredible experience. My voice was mostly gone after 1 quarter. Long drive home but we are alternating every rest area

Absolutely incredible experience. My voice was mostly gone after 1 quarter. Long drive home but we are alternating every rest area

beat wrote:Absolutely incredible experience.   My voice was  mostly gone after 1 quarter.     Long drive home but we are alternating every rest area

Beat if you attend another game you can stay with me and drive home the next day. (I could show you a few other places I worked!)

That's what I'm talkin' about! Great job, Boston! Get the broom out!! ?The next 3 games are OURS!!

Of course, ATL will adjust. Celtics will have to adjust as well or we will be down 3-1 heading back to ATL. We will just have to do what we just did better on Sunday.

db

Congratulations to Brad Stevens and the post 3 Amigos era Boston Celtics on winning their first playoff game!  Confucius said "the journey to #18 begins with a single win".










Ok, now that I've gotten that tortured linkage between sex, the Celtics and Eastern philosophy out of the way...


Good news, bad news, good news, bad news, good news, bad news, good news.  Have to love being able to end on good news...

Good news is that we won.  An ugly win, especially in the playoffs, is infinitely better than any kind of loss.  The bad news is that we blew a 20 point lead.  The good news is that after Atlanta rallied back and tied it up at 96-96 with 6:50 left (TONS of time to finish any swoon!) we went on a 15-7 run to finish out.  When it was gut-check time for us, we rallied back.  The bad news is that they got numerous shots at the rim in those final minutes that should have gone in.  The good news is that they didn't, just like ours weren't dropping in the 1st half of game 1 and both halves of game 2.  The bad news is that 38% of our offense came from just one player.  The good news is I DON'T CARE!!  We needed a win, by any means, more than we needed balance.  

We shot 46%.  That is one helluva lot closer to our season average than what we've been seeing for a few weeks now.  Nothing like home cooking.


Absolute Keepers (Game 3 ONLY)

Isaiah Thomas - There's our little all-star Mighty Mite!  A career high 42 points but, most importantly, on efficent 12-24 shooting, 5-12 from 3.  He finally got to the line, 15 times.  Only 1 assist and 1 TO.  Not a floor general?  Who cares?  Brad fixed that by starting Turner instead of Smart.  If you'll notice, a lot of the time it was Smart or Turner bring the ball up as Thomas played off the ball and shot.  It's ironic that my concern about him this year was that he couldn't play without the ball anymore than Turner can but this time it was magic unleashed.  He finally got off the schneid.

Jonas Jerebko - Brad made the decision to go with energy and offense over coal freighter bulk and speed to start the game and it worked.  Jonas was everywhere, right out of the gate and all the way through.  Thomas got the Sportcenter highlights and ESPN crawler credits but Jerebko was incredibly impactful.  A double double on 5-12 shooting and 12 boards, 3 offensive, in 37 minutes.  4 assists, no turnovers and a block.  He was a man out there.  We needed something from that spot last night.  We needed someone to help Amir handle the Atlanta front court and Jonas Jerebko stepped up.  Big time.  Furthermore, Millsap was only 3-9 for 8 points.  He was 0-1 from 3.  Millsap has been a stone in our sneakers every game this year but not last night.  Sully showed he cannot stay in front of Millsap.  Jerebko fixed that problem.



Good, but not locks

Evan Turner - He ran the offense, which left IT free to be the offense.  5 TOs but 7 assists and 5 steals.  He was, in short, the Jack-of-all-trades-master-of-none he is and can be and we needed that.  We needed to simplify IT's role and Turner made that possible.

Marcus Smart - Ok, maybe not the smartest player but he works hard.  11 points on 3-6, 2-4 from 3, is more than acceptable from him.  I'm not asking nor expecting him to be a scorer.  I just don't want him to kill us with offensive ineptness.  He is paying the price for developing a rep for flopping now.  The refs are letting him take shots that would earn a whistle otherwise.

Amir Johnson - Another yeoman-like work effort from Amir.  15 points on lovely 7-8, 7 boards and 2 blocks.  He anchored us last night.  Horford was 4-10 for 8 points.  He was an impressive 6 assists and 1 TO, but that's not Amir's fault, someone else was letting their men get free for Horford to get the ball to.  Last night our front court, both of them, were better than theirs.  Individually and collectively.

Terry Rozier - Not an eye-popping performance, but the rook is showing he can hang.  He committed one stupid TO, allowing himself to be herded to the sideline and trapped, but that's the type of thing he won't do next year.  Have I mentioned how much I love his rebounding?  Maybe once or twice?


NOT BIG game players

Jared Sullinger - Who?  How does a guy who has grown to where he has his own gravitational field manage to disappear?

Jae Crowder - I'm trying to remember his ankle is, allegedly, about 75% but his offense has completely, totally disappeared.  Another 1-11 night, 1-7 from 3.  Make up your mind, Jae.  If your ankle is an issue and is affecting your shooting then stop shooting.  If it's affecting your ability to defend, because you can't push off that foot, then hit your damn shots.  He isn't driving, he isn't jump shooting...



Absolute Keepers (Series-to-date)

Nobody, really.  IT just had his first good game after 2 stinkers.  His head is still below water, as far as I'm concerned, still has something to prove.  


Good, but not locks

Jonas Jerebko - In addition to his excellent game last night he has been solid in a more limited role in games 1 and 2 also.

Terry Rozier - A couple of solid outings, nothing amazing, but worthy of keeping.  He played a total of 311 minutes all season.  That's 161 minutes fewer than he played in Maine.  He has 41 in 2 playoff games already.  He wouldn't be playing at all if Bradley was healthy, but he's doing as good a job as can be expected for someone so raw at this level.

Marcus Smart - A solid outing on both offense and defense has solidified this place for him, after 2 good defensive but awful offensive games.  He is not an NBA starter, his replacement by Turner because of his woeful offense is evidence of that, but he's a gamer.  You cannot measure, and you cannot do without, ganas and he has it by the bucketful.  


NOT BIG game players

Jared Sullinger - His free agent value is going south like a duck in winter.  His mpg this series has gone from 19 in game 1, to 14, to 11 last night.  He's shooting 7-21 on the series.  He has 14 rebounds in those 44 minutes, which isn't a bad rebound/minute average, but I cannot remember many of those rebounds being of significance.  He isn't carving out space for himself underneath and ripping rebounds away from people like he used to.  We've seen before how, if Sully isn't starting and getting big minutes, he has a morale drop.  You gotta earn those minutes, Sully.  Daddy needs to have a long talk, over a salad, with him.  That's not a basketball player!  It's a space station!  Call off the attack!  Probably the worst thing that ever happened to Sully was the injury to Kelly Olynyk.  Kelly was the yin to Sully's yang (damn, another Asian allusion).  Just the threat of Kelly's outside shooting opened up the floor for interior players like Amir and Sully.  Kelly forced their other big outside and, if they reversed roles and Sully went outside and Kelly tried to post up, then either they switched their center onto Kelly and left Sully being guarded by a smaller player, or they didn't switch and Kelly posted up a smaller player (we've seen Kelly calling for the ball down low a lot more recently because of that).  Atlanta's ability to pack the paint, due to our lack of outside shooters with Bradley and Kelly out, was a major factor for why we were so ineffective in game 2.  Amir has done a great job of overcoming that while Sully, to say the least, has not.


Every game we win lets us live to fight another day.  Every day we live to fight is another day we can win.  Every day we live to fight is another day closer to Kelly, and perhaps Bradley, coming back and getting that paint re-opened.  We need to win the next one.  If we do, whether it's by 100 or just 1, it evens the series up.  2-2 is 2-2 however and wherever you get there and you have to win 4.  The order you win them in is irrelevant.  We need other players to help IT out on offense, we cannot count on another 40 point game from him.  If we win Sunday then the pressure goes on them to win in Atlanta because if they don't, they'll be coming back to Boston down 3-2 and the sneaker will be on the other foot.


bob
P.S.  I see why Jeff Teague was on the block at the trade deadline.  Teague had a nice game but Dennis Shroder, mit der umlaut, is showing something this series and Atlanta wants to trade Teague when his value is high and hand the reins to Schroder.  Fiesty little bastard, isn't he?  Would he be available?


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Nice analysis as always Bob, definitely enjoy you weaving the visual into the narrative.

No mention of Rozier's rebounding? Oh wait it is in there!

Nice to have a sense of optimism back, though I'm somewhat holding my breath until we hear whether IT is in the clear or not.

cowens/oldschool wrote:bob great post

Hawks aren't that good, if we had AB I firmly believe we would be up 2-1, and about to go up 3-1 despite Sully and Crowder. Amir outplayed Horford last night, imagine what a primetime McHale would do to him? Sully is turning into a player with no position, he can't stay in front on Milsap, hes only good on those bulky slow dinosaurs, but any decent one of those can shot over him cause he has no lift, and lost whatever little lift he had.....sadly he might be out of the league very soon, well Tyler Hansborough is still in the league, maybe he can hold on for another season or too. Guy refused to dedicate and reshape his body, sometimes people are their own worst enemy.

Smart plays so hard, he went down so hard on his back, I felt the pain from here, then there he was running hard a few seconds later, tough kid, definitely a keeper just for bouncing back so fast and still going so hard. He played some great position defense, but couldn't get any calls, his flopper rep is out there with the refs now- not good. That kid has got to be sore as shit, plus got kneed hard in the ribs the previous game and you know he will be battling next game- hes my kind of player.

Amir and Jonas were huge in this game for us doing the dirty work that needs to get done. Great seeing IT carrying us, we need Smart and Turner and some day Rozier to get better looks for IT by initiating the offense so IT can move without the ball similar to GS with Curry, hey its a copy cat league and it started with Cousy and Sharman. Wish Sam could see this, was a thrilling game last night, loved the way Stevens was complimenting the team in time outs even after they lost the lead saying their doing a great job, scratching and clawing, to embrace the moment and have fun out there....that even got me to relax and enjoy the game more!!!

cow

cow,

Injuries are part of the game.

Check out this vine and then tell me what you think about Smart's fall.


https://vine.co/v/iU7Di7L605W



bob


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Bob.
Did you really see the first game of this series?How can you say that Smart had 2 awful offensive games?M. Smart 28:49 5-10 2-3 3-6 +6 3 5 2 1 2 1 4 15 ,is that an awful offensive game?

Wow is that video for real? Real time I thought Korver decked him, but I think after NBA refs watch this Smart will never get the slightest benefit of the doubt. Not good.

international wrote:Bob.
Did you really see the first game of this series?How can you say that Smart had 2 awful offensive games?M. Smart  28:49 5-10 2-3 3-6 +6 3 5 2 1 2 1 4 15 ,is that an awful offensive game?

Hi International,

Game 1 he was good.  Game 2 he was 1-11 for 3 points.  Together he was 6-21 for 18 points.  I don't consider scoring 9 ppg on 28.5% shooting good quality offensive output.  Perhaps a better way to put it should have been "after being awful overall the two previous games" but that comment did come out of my "series-to-date" opinion so I thought I had it covered. Sorry.

On another note, have you watched many games with Dragan Bender this year?  There's a good chance we'll have a draft pick high enough to pick him, if he is worth it and what we need.  Is he?


bob


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cowens/oldschool wrote:bob thats a wood floor, hes way in the air falling straight on his back, not rolling like a jiu jitsu master.

He also threw himself off the court like he had been hit by an express train. He was barely touched by Korver. He did it to himself.


bob


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Hi Bob.
Frankly I have not seen many games of Dragan Bender this year.I saw him in the past playing with the junior team of Croatia and he has a lot of talent.In Croatia they consider him....The best prospect since Tony Kucoc,even better than Dario Saric and Mario Hezonja.My opinion is that he is a project who is going to be very good,and I don't know if the Celtics will prefer another prospect more ready to contribute right now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n5uqaiVfxgY

https://youtu.be/fcgNGDNyuG4

Missed the game and will miss Sunday's matchup.

The Celtics are back in it.  No quit in this team.

Dboss

Over a salad. Bob, that was funny! Saw the game on dvr today. What a joy. Jerebko is the man. Sure hope we keep him. Evan too.