Boston Celtics at Brooklyn Nets
Team Totals: Celtics 109.5, Nets 110.5
Injury Report: Ben Simmons (O, Welp)
Celtics projected starters: Marcus Smart, Jaylen Brown, Jayson Tatum, Al Horford, Daniel Theis
Nets projected starters: Kyrie Irving, Seth Curry, Kevin Durant, Bruce Brown, Andre Drummond
Udoka quotes: Said they were picking on the Nets’ weaker matchups, said forcing turnovers was huge for them, said Robert Williams looked good and came out of Game 3 OK, hinted Time Lord is going to get more minutes, said they’re going to attack matchups again, said they’ll live with Bruce Brown going off.
Nash quotes: Said unforced turnovers were the biggest thing, said the Celtics are clearly loading up on KD, said they aren’t connecting on the simple passes, said their help D was bad, said they’re not containing the basketball right now, said they have to play with more pace and get more output in transition, said KD and Kyrie “gotta be tired” with Kyrie fasting and KD playing so many minutes.
Stats and Notes:
*The Celtics continue to win so many aspects of the game with better shot selection and transition play. They lead the playoffs in points-plus per possession and they’re getting more at-rim and 3-point volume. The Nets have a playoff-low 29.3% of shots coming from deep, and the Nets are also last in wide-open 3-point attempts in the playoffs at 9.3 per game (Boston 16 per game).
*Jayson Tatum was the offensive focal point again with a whopping 61 frontcourt touches in the last game (Smart second at 44). The Celtics were hunting matchups for Tatum to attack, and Udoka already said they’re going to have a similar game plan here. He did see a little more Bruce Brown, but the Celtics were able to switch off him a bunch. Plus, he’s also leading the playoffs in transition scoring (tied with Giannis). Tatum’s usage rate jumped to 39.4 after just 23.7 in Game 2 and 27.1 in Game 1, and the Nets just have nobody to stop him. Expect a monster game.
*Jaylen Brown’s role has been pretty consistent in this series, and he saw a little more Seth Curry after the Nets were hiding Curry more on Theis earlier in the series – Time Lord coming back changed things a bit. He’s still a solid option, but I’d lean more into Tatum.
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