NBA Matchups: April 20

Brooklyn Nets at Boston Celtics

Team Totals: Nets 111.3, Celtics 114.8

Injury Report: Nothing new

Nets projected starters: Kyrie Irving, Seth Curry, Bruce Brown, Kevin Durant, Andre Drummond

Celtics projected starters: Marcus Smart, Jaylen Brown, Jayson Tatum, Al Horford, Daniel Theis

Nash quotes: Said the bad start to the second half killed them, said they were really able to crowd KD and be physical, said they’ll figure out ways they can help KD to score.

Udoka quotes: Said they were able to take advantage of how the Nets were guarding Tatum, said their offense helped their defense a lot (getting their defense set), said Al was great and Udoka encouraged the bigs to hit the glass hard.

Stats and Notes: 

*The Celtics were able to dominate inside with 43.2% of their shots coming at the rim, and that figures to be a part of their game plan again. Boston also was able to pick up their speed, crush on the glass with a ridiculous 42.1 putback points per 100 misses, and keep their mid-range shots in check. The Nets did defend pretty well in the playoffs, and they put the clamps on the Celtics in the halfcourt.  The Nets had horrendous shot selection in the opener, which is pretty standard for them with their stars being so capable on jumpers. The Nets had just eight wide-open 3-pointers in Game 1, too.

*The matchup stuff pretty much goes out the window on the Nets stuff, but we did see the Celtics really prioritize using their team defense to make it tough on Kevin Durant. Durant only had eight uncontested shots (Kyrie 16) while he was contested a whopping 16 times (made four). As great as Marcus Smart is, this matchup looks like it’s going to be tougher for KD. Of course, he’s always in play.

*As mentioned, Kyrie got so many clean looks, and he made all four of his contested shots, as well. Kyrie is basically matchup-proof on any one-on-one defender, so he should still be OK against Smart.