Joe Mazzulla recognized after last season that they couldn’t rely on their 3-point shot-making in the playoffs. It’s a big reason why they added Kristaps Porzingis. And while they have still taken the most 3-pointers in the league this year, they’ve proven they can win in other ways.
Tuesday night represented the latest example, a rare night in which these Celtics almost refused to take any 3-pointers. On this night, their advantage inside over a 76ers team without reigning MVP Joel Embiid was too obvious. And when it got hairy in the fourth, the Celtics turned to their defense to finish the job of a convincing 117-99 win over the 76ers, their ninth consecutive victory.
Jaylen Brown scored 31 points, Jayson Tatum had a near triple-double of 29 points, 11 rebounds and eight assists, and Porzingis added 23 points and they still cruised to this victory after making five 3-pointers and taking 22 shots from deep, both season lows. Instead, they bludgeoned the Sixers inside with a 64-42 advantage in the paint as they went a season-best 34-for-37 from the free throw line.
Tyrese Maxey scored 32 points for the 76ers, who dominated the shot margin but are still reeling in the absence of Embiid.
The Celtics, despite their different-than-usual shot selection, led at halftime before they went on a 10-0 run out of halftime. They led by as many as 14 in the third quarter as they continued to kill the Sixers inside. But the visitors fought back behind Maxey, who had 30 points through three quarters, and the Sixers trimmed their deficit to two early in the fourth after Cameron Payne and Tobias Harris combined to make three consecutive triples.
But the C’s responded in a big way after Mazzulla called timeout as they went on a 17-0 run to put the game away, a surge sparked by defense as they held the 76ers scoreless over a five-minute stretch.
Some other takeaways from the win:
– There figures to be some experimentation done by Mazzulla over the final stretch of the regular season, and there was an interesting one on Tuesday. Typically, Tatum sits midway through the first quarter and returns with the bench unit for the start of the second quarter, while Brown plays the entire first and sits to start the second quarter. On Tuesday, Mazzulla flipped that.
Tatum played well with the change as he finished the first with nine points and five assists. There were some mixed results from Brown, who had a shot blocked and committed an offensive foul as he led the second unit, but did well in other instances as he found advantages and had success getting to the free-throw line on looks around the basket.
– The Celtics lead the league in 3-point attempts per game – they entered Tuesday with 46.2 looks from deep per game – but had a significantly different shot profile in the first half. They took just two shots from long range in the second quarter, as they went 2-for-11 from deep in the first half. Mazzulla always looks at the shot margin as a method of success, but the Sixers outshot the Celtics 52-35 in the first half, including 10 more 3-pointers. The C’s gave up six offensive rebounds and committed eight turnovers in the first half, leading to that shot disparity, but still led by two at halftime.
– Derrick White led a Celtics block party on Tuesday with three swats in the opening five minutes of the game. White, who also had three blocks in the first quarter in last Thursday’s win over the Bulls, has 65 blocks in 54 games this season. He’s 11 blocks away from matching his career-best 76 blocks he recorded last season.