The Celtics set an ignominious record on Monday in their loss to New York. As Brian Windhorst of ESPN writes, their 60 three-point attempts were the most ever taken by a team in a playoff game, but their 45 three-point misses also represented a new high-water mark for the NBA postseason.
Boston hasn’t been shy this season about firing away from beyond the three-point arc. The team’s 48.2 attempts per game during the regular season were nearly six more than that of second-place Golden State (42.4). After making just 25.0% of their outside shots in a Game 1 loss, they expressed mixed feelings about having attempted 60 three-pointers compared to just 37 two-point tries.
“I look at the process and the shot quality, (and) our shot quality was high,” head coach Joe Mazzulla said. “There were probably eight to 10 shots that could be better at for sure.”
ESPN’s data backs up Mazzulla’s assertion. According to ESPN Research, 45 of the Celtics’ three-point attempts were “uncontested,” but the team missed 32 of those shots. Celtics stars Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum suggested after the game that they probably should’ve tried to get to the rim more often as those misses piled up.
“In those moments when the other team got momentum you can’t just fire up threes to break up momentum,” Brown said, per Windhorst. “You got to get to the free throw line, get to the paint, get to the basket, maybe get an easy two. You hit some free throws and then maybe the next three-pointer feels a little bit better.”
Here’s more on the Celtics:
- The Celtics essentially cruised to a title last season, never losing a Game 1 or more than a single game in any playoff series. However, as Jay King of The Athletic writes, Mazzulla predicted ahead of the second round that his team would have to overcome more adversity this time around if it hoped to repeat. “There’s been great teams that have gone down (in series), great teams that have blown leads, kept leads, all that stuff just kind of goes into the nature of the competitive arena that you’re in, and you have to take the good with the bad if you plan on being in it for a good amount of time,” Mazzulla said before the Game 1 loss. “So studying that gives you the perspective you need to get to where you want to get to.”
- Celtics center Kristaps Porzingis exited Monday’s game with 7:34 left in the second quarter and didn’t return due to an illness, as Souichi Terada of MassLive.com writes. Mazzulla said after the game that he hadn’t had a chance to check on Porzingis, who went scoreless in 13 minutes of action. “Obviously it impacts the game with his ability on both ends of the floor, and it obviously changes sub patterns or changes the things that you’re able to do matchup-wise and play-call frequency wise, so yeah, I think we felt it,” the Celtics’ coach said of the big man’s absence. “But it’s no excuse. We had plenty of opportunities to do it, and hopefully he’s ready for Game 2.”
- In an interesting story for The Boston Globe (subscription required), Adam Himmelsbach takes an in-depth look at the impact that former child chess prodigy Josh Waitzkin has had on Mazzulla. According to Himmelsbach, Waitzkin – who was featured in the 1993 film ‘Searching For Bobby Fischer’ – was quietly hired by the Celtics as a consultant for this season and has become one of Mazzulla’s “most trusted” confidants. “Josh is great at finding certain segments of the game where it either went really well or it didn’t go well and seeing it from a non-tactical perspective,” Mazzulla explained. “It’s more getting into the mind of an individual fighter or performer.”
- In a feature story for The Athletic, Jay King explores how Brad Stevens‘ time at Butler helped provide a blueprint for him to build the roster that turned the Celtics into champions. “Brad understands the most important thing in any organization, whether it’s the business world or sports world, is people,” said Zach Hahn, a former Butler guard who played for Stevens. “And he surrounds himself and finds people that live by the same standards that he lives by.”
Aaron Gordon has more playoff buzzer beaters within the last 10 days then Jayson Tatum does for his career. Dude is not clutch.
Jayson Tatum is overrated.
Young Durant is far better than Tatum
Who blew the buzzer beater in regulation again? Exactly. Tatum doesn’t deserve his ring. The other Celtics are champs, but he is not.
Everyone who reply guy’d me to disrespect me when I told you Tatum was a choke artist and Brown is the only real star on the Celtics, the line to apologize starts here:
C’s meltdown was ugly
Knicks r trash & boston let em steal 1 @ their house
a W is a W but knicks lucky celtics turned into the wizards in the 4th Q. Ill give credit to only 1 knick, OG. He did good
The old adage in NBA. If you are a shooter. You keep shooting. Also if they are not dropping. You get to the line. Shoot from there. That will get your shooting going. Bad shooting happens to every team. Celtics went to OT lost by three. And played a bad gane without KP.
Well who cares. Those are their issues. Knicks are up 1-0 and thats all that matters. Brudges and Towns didn’t score this game. Were well below their avg. Celtics were a better team during season. Well this is a new season. All about three more wins. Thats the only thing Knicks need to focus on. We all know Celtics aren’t going away. OK let’s do this ….
OKC 68 wins, dominant 1st rd.
Nuggets suddenly remembered they won the championship only 2 yrs ago & the young blood thunder couldnt close it out under pressure.
Playoff basketball!
OKC gave away Game 1 on a bad coaching strategy. They chose to foul on the closing seconds and send them to the line just to avoid Denver to shoot from three. They were up by 3 with 13 seconds to go and they did that, they did it again until they missed their own and gave them the last shot to win. OKC needed just to defend a three which is not that difficult. Terrible decision,
The late fouls were fine if they’d let more time come off the clock. They should’ve never Denver make it close in the first place.
Yes, the time not coming off the clock was bad strategy. SGA driving to the hoop with 12.9 seconds and scoring instead of dribbling it around and making them foul him was a mistake. Could have gotten it down to ~8 seconds, with SGA shooting two FTs already up one.
But fouling Gordon 70′ from the basket immediately after the inbound was insane. Inbounded at 11.1 seconds, fouled Gordon at 10.7 seconds. You’re up three. You play press and foul only after they get the ball across half court. Could have taken 2-3 seconds off there. So SGA’s move could have taken 2+ seconds off, and not fouling immediately could have taken 3 seconds off. Gordon should have been shooting FTs down 3 with only 5-6 seconds left instead of 10.7. Then Denver wouldn’t have been able to get such a good look on the game winner after Chet’s missed FTs. Good strategy to foul, ridiculously bad execution.
Also they did foul immediately twice, at least if you will do that let the clock run a few seconds. Worst strategy i’ve seen in a while.
man everyone on here acting like the celtics are cooked. they lost 1 game and they set a record for most misses and only lost by 2. the Knicks didn’t cause this, they simply just missed. if the Celtics even shoot remotely a normal % they win by 10+. imo the Knicks got lucky, nothing else.
Brunson thrived, OG strived…Celtics in 5.