Winning Ugly Is Still Winning Last Time I Checked

Heading into this game with the Magic, I can’t say I was all that worried. Sure they just dropped 120+ and beat MIL, but MIL specializes in underachieving. And yes the Magic did beat BOS in their own building but I can’t explain it, I had no concerns whatsoever about this game. Based on the way this game started, I was proud of myself for not falling for the trap. It looked like the Celtics were going to cruise and everyone could get rest before the big game against NO tomorrow. Boy was I wrong. I forgot that just when you think the Celtics have something in the bag, they turn into complete dickheads.

It wasn’t a pretty win. It wasn’t even an “eh it’s late at the bar I’ll settle for this” win. This my friends was one of the ugliest wins all year. The good news is you still get the full amount of credit for the win despite how awful it was to watch. Given that the Celts had dropped two in a row, I’ll take it.

OK, let’s get started

The Good

– Yesterday in the Smart blog I talked about how this was obviously a time where Terry Rozier was going to have to step up and continue his strong play. The guy has been lights out since January and last night was no exception. He played a team high 34 minutes and finished with a solid 17/7/5 and a +21

This also marked the 12th straight game Terry has had at least 2 3PM in a game, and looking closer he’s had at least 3 in five of the six games this month. If this isn’t the very definition of a player blossoming offensively, I have no idea what is.

But here’s probably my favorite part about this whole Rozier development. He’s taking care of the basketball. He currently has the lowest TOV% of his career at 8.3%, while also having the highest usage rate of his career at 20.1%. Since February 1st it’s even better, with a 22% usage and 7% TOV%. The biggest thing early for Rozier in his career was playing under control. His rookie year he had a crazy high 14% TOV% and always seemed to be moving too fast for his own good. Now he has the confidence and control you would expect from a third year player and look, he’s taking off.

– The Moose is loose folks. Another dominant performance from Monroe for the second unit, we’re starting to see him A) Get in slightly better shape and B) Feel more confident in this system. You combine both of those things and this is what that looks like

When they brought him in this is what I envisioned. Being able to drop it down to him and let him overpower opposing bench bigs and that’s what we got. I’ll take 17/5 on 6-8 shooting in 21 minutes every day of the week and you should too. I am just slightly concerned that he relies on that super wide open spin move just a little too much and once a playoff team gets that on film it may not be as available. The good news is Monroe has post moves that would make Hakeem Olajuwon sweat so it shouldn’t be that big of a deal. He’s still turnover prone, but given how he looked when he first got to BOS, this version is a completely different player who is now pretty important to their success.

– This game also brought the return of Al Horford, and if you’re wondering why this team got off to such a good start, he was a main reason. First off I loved his aggressiveness, I haven’t seen him take 18 FGA in what feels like months. He finished with a solid 15/9/3 and a team high +22. No surprise the defense looked so much better to start, mostly because it was ORL but also because this team got their defensive anchor back. Considering Horford was 2nd on the team with a +32.9 net rating and had a 68.6 Drtg, I think it’s safe to say he made an impact

– Speaking of the defense, again while accepting that this was the fucking Magic, this was still the best overall team defense we’ve seen the Celtics play in a while. Their rotations were crisp, they weren’t allowing second chance opportunities, and guys from the perimeter to the paint were locked in

Holding ORL to 39/17% splits and causing 15 TOs is a formula I can get behind, and the Celtics did a really good job of making life hard for Augustin/Simmons, two guys who had just combined for 60+ points against MIL. In this game, they went 10-26. That’s good stuff.

– I may be over exaggerating, but I don’t think I am. I think Shane Larkin could be a rotation guard for almost any team in the East right now. He’s the Celtics 4th guard. I know for SURE that many teams in the NBA do not have a 4th guard that is this good. Love Shane Larkin, I’m already convinced he’s going to win this team a playoff game somehow, some way

The Bad

– Can we saw the entire offense? I mean the Celtics finished with 37/34% splits so it’s not exactly like they made many shots. They only had 16 assists on 31 makes which isn’t great. They also blew their 24 point lead for the second game in a row which is so them. This team just refuses to blow teams out I don’t get it. The way this game started we should have gotten like 18 minutes of Yabu in the second half but of course the Celts would make this a 8-12 point game forcing Brad to keep guys in. That was annoying.

– It also wasn’t the best night for Jayson Tatum, who finished with just 8 points on 3-8 shooting. Personally I was expecting him to come out BLAZING, as a way to make up for what happened against WSH, but that wasn’t really the case. To be honest I didn’t love his shot selection

not nearly enough at the rim for my liking. We can be fair and realize that this was really his first poor game this entire month, and just the second or third time he has been underwhelming since the AS Break, but that doesn’t mean I have to like how he played. I need Tatum to beast against these shitty teams so he has all the confidence in the world once they play someone with talent.

– Same goes for Morris (4-15). Need him better offensively but this was probably just the other side of the coin for him. After his performance against WSH you could see this coming from a mile away in my opinion.

– I want to like Nader, I really do. I thought he made some good plays defensively last night at times and that was good to see. But for fucks sake man sometimes less is more on offense. Sometimes you can just take the corner three you don’t have to make things 10000x tougher on yourself by trying to score over three dudes in the paint. Unfortunately we’re probably going to see more of him down the stretch, and that slightly scares me.

The Ugly

– We’re starting to see this more and more with this team, where they build a big time lead and then check out. How else are you going to explain that fourth quarter to me? They were lucky to score 17 points after shooting 27/33% and committing 9 TOs. They had 3x the TOs than made baskets. What the hell is that? Sloppy play is the kiss of death with this team, and it’s no surprise that in a game they blew their 24 point lead they also had 18 TOs. Need to clean that up as Tatum had 5, and three guys had at least 3.

– I am going to need an explanation as to why Yabu played just 2:09 in this game. This is the same game that Semi plays 22 minutes? Did Yabu dominate too much in his first career start that Brad wanted to keep him off film for the playoffs? That’s the only thing I can think of, because this was ABSOLUTELY a Yabu worthy game. I know Horford was back but I don’t care. You can find more than 2 fucking minutes for this guy. Look at this!

We now set our sights on a date with NO. If you remember, the Celtics were up 5 with 2 minutes to go against NO back in Boston and Kyrie sort of shit his pants down the stretch, leading to a 116-113 OT loss that was the first of a stretch where the Celts lost 5 of 6. This time around you have a NO team that has lost 3 of their last 4 and play the Rockets tonight. Seeing them on a B2B should help, but if the Celtics show up and play like they did last night in ORL I’m not sure it matters. I’m just happy the Celtics broke their skid and guys are starting to get back into the lineup. It wouldn’t shock me if we see Kyrie tomorrow, and it sounds like Jaylen is a couple weeks away. Based on how the teams in the top 4 are structured there’s nothing wrong with staying in the 2 seed, I just want this team to get back to playing the type of basketball on both ends that doesn’t make me wan to claw my eyes out. We’re getting there.

47 down 7 to go.