NBA Matchups: May 16

Boston Celtics at New York Knicks

Team Totals: Celtics 104.5, Knicks 107

Injury Report: Precious Achiuwa (Q, ankle)

Knicks projected starters: Jalen Brunson, Mikal Bridges, Josh Hart, OG Anunoby, Karl-Anthony Towns

Celtics projected starters: Derrick White, Jrue Holiday, Jaylen Brown, Al Horford, Luke Kornet

Offensive Ranks: Knicks 5th, Celtics 3rd
Defensive Ranks: Knicks 12th, Celtics 5th

Season Series: Celtics 4-0 

Noteworthy Missed Games: Kristaps Porzingis (2 missed), Jrue Holiday (1), Al Horford (1), OG Anunoby (1)

Thibs quotes: Said they didn’t play well for 48 minutes, said KAT couldn’t take it to Jrue because Kornet kept helping on the double team, said he was just searching for answers in the third quarter and that’s why he didn’t make any subs for eight minutes.

Mazzulla quotes: Said KP couldn’t breathe and was available “if absolutely necessary”, said Kornet impacted both ends of the floor, said Kornet was great on the boards and with his rim protection, said adding Hauser added more offensive pace, said he knows KP will be ready for us for Game 6, said his team has been in the league a long time and they’re up for the challenge of trying to come back from 3-1, said Kornet helped minimize some of the offensive rebounding edge from the Knicks.

Stats and Notes:

*The Celtics dominated the Knicks throughout the game and blew the doors off them in the second half. Boston’s interior offense in the second half was a big reason why with 11-of-12 at the rim compared to 2-of-2 at the rim from the Knicks. That’s a huge credit to Luke Kornet, and he was too good to not put in the starting lineup again (we’ll get to KP later). Another big trend of Game 5 was no transition on either side with just 6.9% of the New York possessions and 7.0% for Boston. The difference was the Knicks couldn’t score at all on those chances at 0.33 PPP while Boston has been fairly efficient on their transition plays for much of this series (NYK 1.1 PPP, BOS 1.4 PPP in transition). Of course, the biggest stat is the Celtics killing the Knicks with 22 treys to just 12 from the Knicks. That’s the game, and Boston has been almost unbeatable when they get treys in there, going 22-1 in those games this season (counting playoffs). Boston got up 32 C&S treys in Game 5 compared to 19 from the Knicks, and they made 13-of-21 wide-open attempts overall (61.9%). The Celtics also moved the ball well for 52 potential assists (averaged 35.7 per game in the playoffs before). They didn’t miss Jayson Tatum too much in this one.

*Jaylen Brown needed to bounce back from a rough Game 4, and he turned in one of his most well-rounded games of his career. Brown put up a career-high 12 assists on 18 potentials. Brown led the Celtics in touch time at 6.0 minutes and in drives at 15, as he was the engine of the offense. His 26 points weren’t too far off how he was getting his scoring before with just one layup/dunk, but the jumper was falling for him at 7-of-10. Brown was excellent at getting to his spots with seven of his nine makes coming without an assist. He had no problem with the OG Anunoby matchup, and he was able to hunt Jalen Brunson as effectively as anyone has all postseason. The role is going to be massive and the usage was strong at 27.7% (a little below where it was in the with Derrick White/without Tatum minutes this year). He’ll be in a good spot here, but we’ve seen a lot of duds from Brown this postseason.