2022-2023 POST GAME CROOKLYN - AWAY

Celtics Wrap: Boston Outlasts Undermanned Nets In Brooklyn
No Jaylen Brown, no problem


NESN by Keagan Stiefel

The Boston Celtics improved their winning streak to five games Thursday night, securing a 109-98 victory over the Brooklyn Nets at Barclays Center.

The Celtics improved their NBA-best record to 31-12 while the Nets dropped to 27-14.

ONE BIG TAKEAWAY
On the second night of a back-to-back, the Celtics entered their win over the Nets following a similar script to that of their win over the New Orleans Pelicans on Wednesday.

The Celtics were without a pair of starters in Jaylen Brown and Al Horford, facing an undermanned Nets squad who will be without Kevin Durant for the next several weeks. On Wednesday, it was Robert Williams III and Marcus Smart out for Boston and Zion Williamson out for New Orleans.

Once the game started, however, it became clear the Celtics weren’t playing in a glorified one-on-one game. This was a slog between two of the best teams in the NBA.

The difference for the Celtics? They were playing 5-on-4 on the defensive end, as Ben Simmons refused to shoot the ball after missing his first two attempts. The 26-year-old played a tremendous game defensively and as a facilitator, but didn’t need to be guarded when off the ball offensively. That opened up the ability to switch for Boston defenders.

STARS OF THE GAME
— Marcus Smart was tremendous in his return from a knee bruise. The veteran guard finished with 16 points, 10 assists, six rebounds and two steals.

— Derrick White was superb filling in for Brown in the starting lineup, finishing with 15 points and seven rebounds. He also added another block to his league-leading total of 44 among guards.

— Malcolm Brogdon finished off the guard trifecta, scoring 16 points off the bench. He also grabbed five rebounds.

WAGER WATCH
Simmons nearly surpassed the 23.5 total point, rebound and assist number set by DraftKings Sportsbook pregame, but failed to score a single point. With -110 odds of eclipsing that number, Simmons’ 13 assist, nine rebound night failed to help bettors turn $100 wagers into a net total of $190.91.

UP NEXT
The Celtics will head down south to face the Charlotte Hornets next, kicking off a two-game set from Spectrum Center over the weekend. Tipoff for the first game is 7 p.m. ET on Saturday.

112288

6 PLAYERS IN DOUBLE FIGURES IS MY KIND OF TEAM!

GLAD THEY BEAT THOSE A HOLES!

112288

This is one tremendous Celtics team, especially now that we have regained our defensive prowess. We have so many weapons offensively and defensively. Hats off to several players tonight - of course Jayson and Marcus, but Payton  who was really good off the bench, Derrick who is good offensively and great on defense, and Malcom who is tough as nails all made a big difference . Kornet made several good plays. He may be a bit lunky, but he scores very efficiently and rebounds. Rob Williams is a continual joy to watch on the floor, and the price for resigning Grant keeps going up and up - 3 blocks and 12 points - nothing to sneeze at...

Grant played 43 minutes, the most for either team.

Smart may be our team's heart, but Grant is our ironman.

worcester wrote:This is one tremendous Celtics team, especially now that we have regained our defensive prowess. We have so many weapons offensively and defensively. Hats off to several players tonight - of course Jayson and Marcus, but Payton  who was really good off the bench, Derrick who is good offensively and great on defense, and Malcom who is tough as nails all made a big difference . Kornet made several good plays. He may be a bit lunky, but he scores very efficiently and rebounds. Rob Williams is a continual joy to watch on the floor, and the price for resigning Grant keeps going up and up - 3 blocks and 12 points - nothing to sneeze at...

I thought the difference in this game was our defense, we got a lot of great stops in 4th when we finally built a decent lead. White, Brogdon, Smart, Pritch and Luke all showed a toughness/fire about them that I didn’t see in the Nets. Our little guys outworked their little guys and got stronger as the game went longer and we were the ones on the second night of a b2b. Best game I ever saw from Luke, looks like he is improving and can make shots.

We are 7-0 on the back end of b2b's.

A solid 11 point victory over the #2 team in the EC, elevating our league-leading MoV to +6.1 (#2 is Memphis @ 5.0).  As we go further through the season MoV becomes more and more reliable (Disclaimer: that's true with all stats. The more data points they are based upon the more reliable they are). The Nets are now 2 games behind us in the loss column.  We are now 2-0 vs Brooklyn with 2 more games to play against them this season.  They need to win both to tie us AND they have to pick up 2 games in the loss column with only 1/2 the season left.  A TALL order, especially with KD expected to be out for 4 weeks.  Brooklyn's schedule over the next 4 weeks looks like this:

vs OKC
@ SAS
@ Phoenix
@ Utah
@ GSW
@ Philadelphia
vs Detroit
vs NYK
vs Lakers
@ Boston
vs Washington
vs Clippers
vs Phoenix
vs Chicago
vs Philadelphia

15 games from now through 2/12, 30 days.  9 home, 6 away.  A 5 game west coast road trip against at least 2 tough teams.  2 games vs Philly and 1 vs us.  THREE b2bs, 1 on the WC road trip (Phoenix/Utah), 1 home/away (@ Philly/Detroit) and 1 home/home (Clippers/Suns).  All in the next 30 days.  Not that easy and, without KD consuming 35+mpg (he's averaging 36.0mpg this season), exhausting.  My point in this is that with only 41 games left in their regular season and this schedule coming up it may be tough for them to catch us, unless we hit a serious slump.  Milwaukee is 3 losses back from us and has two more games against us.  We are 1-0 against them so far.  If we split those two games we win the season series and they would need to make up 4 losses against us to edge us @ #1 in the EC.  So, as far as retaining our #1 seed in the East, we're in pretty decent shape.  Denver and Memphis only have 13 losses in the West, so they could take the #1 seed in the Finals if we and either one of them get there, but the East is looking pretty good right now.

I agree with 112288.  6 players in double digits is what I like to see.

Kornet and Pritchard shone off the bench.  Luke was doing some very fine defensive switching, not something he's known for.  He also had 3 offensive boards out of his 5 total and that makes me very happy.  Pritchard was everywhere.  Three offensive boards and they were just pure hustle, none just "fell to him".  As I said on the Game On! thread our back court is SO well-stocked with Smart, White, Brogdon and Jaylen where is there room for Payton Pritchard?  The kid deserves to play more, but how and where?  I find it interesting that Pritchard played 15 minutes while Sam Hauser, who is a more regular rotation player and who is closer in size to Jaylen, only played 5 minutes.  As mentioned in the Game On! thread Pritchard finishes at the rim better than I've ever seen Sam finish despite being much smaller.  It's not the size of the dog in the fight, right?  Payton Pritchard has some serious dog in him.  Fearless.

All in all we had 12 offensive rebounds with Smart, Kornet and Pritchard grabbing 3 each, vs a total of 5 for Brooklyn.  That's 7 more possessions for us, 7 fewer fast break opportunities for them, and that's why I love offensive rebounding.

Kyrie was 9-24, 3-11 from 3 and only 4 ftas in 38 minutes.  More reasons to be happy.

I like TJ Warren.  He's on a 1-year for $2.6M with Brooklyn.  Sign him next year, Brad and dump Justin Jackson, a #15 pick who looks like he's seeing a basketball for the first time.

https://www.espn.com/nba/boxscore/_/gameId/401468782




Bob


.

We should be so lucky to get TJ. That would be a real coup for Brad. Do it Stevens. Do it.

Hi,
Yes, it's a great W.
The main factor, IMO, was mindset of the whole team. Celtics, as a team, just outwilled the opponent.
I wish we play like that in playoffs.

AK

This was an impressive win, of course Brooklyn didn't have KD, but they were rested and we were playing a back to back without Jaylen and Al.

I have to say Kornet was tremendous. I have been very critical of him. At first I thought he was hopeless, then he played well for a stretch of games and I thought he was a decent back up center. However, then he slipped back and was again a liability. The last two games, especially last night he was exactly what we need in a back up center. He even hit a three pointer with a nice stroke. He played good defense and finished shots at the rim. These minutes are very important because its imperative to keep Rob and Al fresh for the playoffs. I hope he can maintain this level of play.

Pritchard was also key last night. His speed is so impressive. His gives us another dimension, and he's not afraid to drive to the hoop. He also has a little microwave in him, he can get real hot real fast. Got to give him credit, he always brings it when his number is called. It's too bad he can't play more, but that's the the problem when the team is so deep at guard.

Brogdon is just so good. He always seems to make the right play. He's the key man now with Jaylen out this next week or two. He is going to have to score and I think we will.

Of course got to give Marcus, Derrick White and JT credit. Marcus was just everywhere. I think Kyrie hates playing against him. He also made some key buckets. D White played great defense. That block he made on Warren was tremendous. He also hit some big threes. The whole team played great D in the fourth quarter, they really locked Kyrie down. What can you say about JT? His shot was off from three, but he got key rebounds, made the right pass, got to the line and scored enough. He's maturing everyday.

worcester wrote:We are 7-0 on the back end of b2b's.

I was just checking our record in B2B games. We have not lost the 2nd game of a B2B. Perhaps even more amazing is that we are 12-0 on 6 of those B2B games and 1-1 in one of those sets of 7 B2B games.

Cowens mentioned defense and that is at the top of my list.

The Celtics are morphing into a defensive team that is starting to look like last year's edition.  They have held opponents under 100 points in 3 of the last 5 games.

The Celtics own the Nets.  It does not matter if we play down there or up in Boston.  It does not matter if Smart or Jaylen or Rob or Horford is out.  They cannot beat the Celtics and at this point we must be dancing in the heads.  We have beaten them in 5 straight regular season games plus 4 straight in the playoffs last year.  That comes to 9 straight over them.

Jayson Tatum did not play well last night.  Way too many early shot clock 3 point attempts plus way too much playing with his food in his ISO mentality.  He went 2-10 from deep and 7-22 overall.  Doc Rivers would have told him to stop with all the 'Hero Shots'

The great thing about this team is the contributions that come from other than the Jays.  

Grant, White, Kornet and Brogdon all played well.  Even Pritchard got it going after it looked like he could not play a lick of basketball.

The Celtics did a great job in the first half protecting the ball but then starting in the 3rd QTR we got B2B turnovers from White and Marcus started to make brain fart pass attempts.  

The Nets did not take full advantage.  

The Nets may have come into the game on an 18-2 run but as dbrown mentioned, they beat up on weak teams.  

The Celtics held Kyrie Irving in check (9-24 and (3-11)  With Durant out I do not see how KI can carry the Nets against quality competition.

The other head case, Ben Simmons, almost put up a double, double (13 assist and 9 rebounds)  Funny, but I only recall one play (a pass on a fast break that led to a layup)  He went 0-3 from the field and of course there were zero free throw attempts.

I'm putting this game in the signature category although I think we could have won by 20.

dboss,

Celtics know the formula for BKN. Make one of them look like a fool. Last night we crossed Kyrie up in the 4th. And since BS wasn't willing to even take a shot, it was 5-on-4 like someone said.

Overall, great game. Brodgen, White, Smart, Kornet, P-Squared, all hustled, drove to the basket and played phenomenal defense. 29-50 shooting inside the 3-point line which is a shade under 60%, plus the fouls/And 1's. Our 3-point shooting intra-game was right on the Mendoza Line of 33%. Nothing ventured, nothing gained there for EV=1 point. Might as well take it inside and they did.

Looks like a set up over the weekend and Monday in Charlotte. By brother-in-law and I were planning on driving down and seeing the Saturday game. Seats we were looking at were $180. Then you add $70+ of ticket charges, etc!! WTH, Bo?!! We'll watch it from home!!

We need to keep the pedal to the metal. No letting up. Run them out of the gym both nights. Don't need a split or God forbid a 2fer losing streak. Need the broom. We went down this street a couple of weeks ago against ORL and that was at home!! Need to rebound and show that 2-game debacle was an anomaly. Feeling more confident this will happen and we don't start another Lather.Rinse.Repeat bad cycle. Anything less than 2 convincing wins in CHA will be a major bummer. The two times I did see the Celtics in Charlotte, we won one and we lost one. Time to rewrite the script!!

db

Reggie Miller needs to do some homework or shut his mouth.
He was saying during the broadcast last night that he was bothered by the fact that neither franchise has removed the interim tag off of their head coaches.

Both situations were and are entirely different but he talked like they were the same.

Minutes later he comes back and says He just got word that Vaughn was named Head Coach and is no longer Interim.
Yes Reggie. That happened back in November and you’re just now getting word?

Ime is suspended and until thats resolved it would be pretty awkward to remove interim off of Joe’s title when technically Ime is still documented and designated Head coach.

We all know that Ime, more then likely will not be back and Reggie doesn't know what he’s talking about.

Ktron wrote:Reggie Miller needs to do some homework or shut his mouth.
He was saying during the broadcast last night that he was bothered by the fact that neither franchise has removed the interim tag off of their head coaches.

Both situations were and are entirely different but he talked like they were the same.

Minutes later he comes back and says He just got word that Vaughn was named Head Coach and is no longer Interim.
Yes Reggie. That happened back in November and you’re just now getting word?

Ime is suspended and until thats resolved it would be pretty awkward to remove interim off of Joe’s title when technically Ime is still documented and designated Head coach.

We all know that Ime, more then likely will not be back and Reggie doesn't know what he’s talking about.

True

You would think that Reggie would know the difference between being suspended but still legally under contract and how that would impact Joe's status an interim coach.

One more comment.

Brogdon only played 20 minutes.  He played  great.

With JB out for a week or two you would think that CJ would play him more.  He is the 3rd best scorer on the team and a legit wing player.

dboss wrote:One more comment.

Brogdon only played 20 minutes.  He played  great.

With JB out for a week or two you would think that CJ would play him more.  He is the 3rd best scorer on the team and a legit wing player.

Very good 2 way heady player always makes the right play, can shoot and score and play both guard spots. When he and White and Smart are on, we are unbeatable.

Ktron,

Reggie did sound like he didn’t show up for class.

Celtic 17,

Excellent post and summary.

NYCelt wrote:Celtic 17,

Excellent post and summary.

Thanks NYCelt, appreciate that.