BOSTON — Sunday’s Celtics game, a seemingly perfect opportunity to get right after a crushing loss to the Kings on Friday, ended with a Boston five-second violation ahead by one point with six seconds remaining, and a CJ McCollum floater that nearly fell for a Pelicans win in the other direction.
Boston returned to the win column without inspiring confidence. The Celtics turned it over at inopportune times, including a fourth quarter in-bounds that bounced off Derrick White and out-of-bounds. They missed layups and shot 29.5% from three. Jayson Tatum’s effective game-icing breakout score came following a missed layup as he scrambled back in-bounds to recover the ball and dunk over Dejounte Murray. The Celtics won on the offensive glass, 18-6, in a 120-119 victory. Moments later, he missed two free throws to give McCollum his chance.
At other moments, Kristaps Porziņģis missed a late rolling layup and earlier tapped his own botched bunny into the air before it finally fell. Luke Kornet missed a fourth quarter dunk. Jrue Holiday charged full court past Trey Murphy III’s press and launched a layup unsuccessfully that Porziņģis tapped back in. The lapses came in such quantity, and comical manner, that it left the Celtics feeling better after the win. Joe Mazzulla called them mistakes with effort, but didn’t totally let the team off the hook after the win.
“I would say the ultimate compliment is we’re 28-11 and these are the types of conversations that we’re having,” he said. “So it’s a beautiful place to be in. I’m serious, I think it’s great. It’s a great standard and a great expectation to have and we have to deliver. So we all know that … what’re we the third team in the league now? Which isn’t great, but it sounds like a morgue in here and that’s how it should be, because of where we’re trying to get to. It’s the ultimate compliment and we just continue to work through it.”
Those challenges have existed all season, along with a starting lineup that lost its minutes again (-2.6 net rating per 100) in the win. They’re a net -8.9 for the season through nine games and have struggled to shoot the ball (50 eFG%) as the Celtics remain stuck in the middle of the league from three (36.2% 3PT, 15th). Worse, they’re seeing opponents heat up and have struggled to balance taking away threes with waiting for opponent’s worst shooters to come back down to earth. The aggressive helping that got the defense back on its feet over the last month has allowed 38.8% three-point shooting since New Year’s Eve — 24th in the league over that stretch.
“Last year to this point, the offense was actually worse from an expected basis, but the actual was better, and they were shooting 39% as opposed to 29% (from three) … we have to be better, but it’s essentially in a training camp form with this particular group … that’s always the conversation. Which one comes first,” Mazzulla said addressing the offense. “I don’t really have an answer for that. What I do know is we have to keep up the process of fighting for the best shot, giving up the best shots, making the necessary plays to win, executing, building trust, building accountability amongst each other, we just have to continue to work that process with each other.”
The Celtics missed 10 of their first 11 three-point attempts to begin a game where they’d find little rhythm from deep. Holiday, Porzingis and White all missed on one early possession. New Orleans’ ball pressure bothered Boston, whether McCollum and Murray playing up on Tatum and Brown, or Jose Alvarado’s activity into the second unit. Zion Williamson, in his first game back from suspension, mostly played a roaming help role that blew up multiple Boston possessions into the second quarter.
The Pelicans led 26-15 midway through the first, Murray sinking three triples that Tatum and Payton Pritchard fought to keep up with into the second. New Orleans scored on 6-of-10 possessions between quarters and on 18 of their first 29. Brown got on the board after an 0-for-4 start only early into the second frame, but Alvarado hit back-to-back threes. Boston wouldn’t find a window to take a lead until the Pelicans dove deep into the bench with Brandon Ingram and Herb Jones missing while Williamson played with a 28-minute limit.
“Murray was shooting 29% on the season and he’s 6-for-9 tonight,” Mazzulla said. “He’s at his best when he gets you on the side of him and he gets downhill. There are probably a couple where we have to be better on the contest. We just gotta continue to work through it. There were opportunities for us to force more turnovers, there were opportunities for us to protect the paint a little more. You just gotta continue to chip away at it.”
Kornet, Brown and White took a lead with a 6-0 run against that group before Willie Green rushed Williamson back into the game. He blew up three straight plays, nearly tossing down a one-handed alley oop as the Pelicans followed all three with baskets. Brown, on-ball, gave away the ball while Williamson snuck behind him. A pair of Porzingis scoring plays and blocks sent the Celtics into halftime with a lead, but not playing well. In the third, Boston set up Tatum out of the corners with the team’s best passing of the night before he gave the ball away on back-to-back possessions and a five-point lead dwindled to two.
Williamson pummeled Kornet early in the fourth, who picked up a fifth foul, but Mazzulla left him on the floor alongside Horford and lost a challenge on a three-point play McCollum scored through Hauser. Between White’s in-bounds turnover and Tatum fouling Murray on a three, the Celtics lost a four-point advantage and trailed midway through the frame. Boston followed with five straight stops and four straight points from Tatum.
They nearly blew it again after, but didn’t. Enough for today, until the Celtics regroup and assess what’s working tomorrow.
“Sometimes, when you have the same team, we have this expectation that we’re gonna just pick up there,” Mazzulla said. “And it’s different. Different year. People in different spaces. So we have to reestablish that and we have to work that. It just takes time. This is the space that we’re in. I love the fact that we’re not happy. It’s the best place to be in and we’ll figure it the hell out.”
