It wasn’t the prettiest display of basketball from the Celtics. They trailed 112-106 just before the 5-minute mark of the fourth quarter to a new-look Pistons team with a newfound level of competence on both sides of the floor.
While clutch minutes are technically in effect in a 5-point game with under 5 minutes to go, the true moment this game clicked into full-on clutch mode began at the 4:25 mark, when Al Horford checked in for Luke Kornet with the Celtics still trailing by six.
In a second half where the tap ran cold on Boston’s 3-ball, possessions grew into more late shot clock misfires, and Detroit’s backcourt duo of Jaden Ivey and Cade Cunningham lifted their team into a winning position, the clutch gene sprouted from the entire Celtics starting 5 in their first true late-game minutes of the season.
In that span, the Celtics outscored the Pistons 18-6, got points from every starter aside from Horford, and held the Ivey/Cunningham duo to a combined 1/6 from the field. Three of Boston’s four field goals were assisted, the lone unassisted bucket being Jayson Tatum’s turnaround dagger from the corner with 29 seconds left.
Prior to the season, Joe Mazzulla said he hoped to see the target directly between the eyes rather than on the team’s backs. He got that challenge to close out the Pistons, which felt like a team doing everything it could to keep the Celtics out of their usual rhythm, and Boston still found a way to dig its heels in and make the plays it needed to make.
“It’s not always going to be pretty, and we understand who we are and what comes with that,” Tatum told NBC Boston’s Abby Chin after the game. “We’re going to get everybody’s best shot. It’s a long game. We can’t think that they’re going to go away. That’s a prideful team, they’ve got some vets on their team now and they made it tough on us.”
Defensively, it’s impossible to pick out a singular hero on a unit that collectively stepped up to finish the job.
Jaylen Brown started things with a big steal on an inbounds after Horford checked in and later took on the Cunningham switch and forced him out of rhythm, leading to a late shock clock heave. Then there was Jrue Holiday, who stripped both Ivey and Tobias Harris on a single possession to set up go-ahead free throws on the other end from Tatum. And, last but far from least, there’s Derrick White, who recorded his first three blocks of the season, the biggest being a revenge denial on Cunningham, who successfully dunked on the All-Defensive Team guard earlier in the game.
“I hadn’t had a block all season so I had to work my way back,” White said in his shared presser with Tatum.
Offensively, the key elements that led not only to two blowout wins but their early 22-point lead in this game finally came back in crunch time.
Struggling in the second half to find their way inside the arc to create kickout opportunities, the floor finally started to open up with the starting unit back out there, beginning with their possession with 3:50 left that started with a high screen-and-roll between Horford and Tatum that forced some strong weakside help from Tim Hardaway Jr., which opened the door for a kickout to White and that famed extra pass to the corner to Holiday for three.
On the very next possession, we saw the extra pass again make an appearance, this time with Brown running the open floor, pulling out a stunning behind-the-back dribble and kicking out with three defenders in the paint to force a way-too-late rotation as Tatum fed one more pass to the wing for another Holiday 3-pointer and a tie game.
The connectivity that was missing during nearly all of the third quarter and most of the fourth entered the fold at just the right time.
Not every game’s going to be a beatdown of 20+ points, as much as we’d like to believe it based on this team’s extensive history of beating the crap out of most opponents. What we saw from last year’s team was an ability to not only run away with victories, but also win the ugly ones as well, taking victories that maybe don’t file away into the collective memory of the fanbase as the team at its best.
But that is ultimately a team at its best, when even on a Saturday night against a team most pundits have cast aside as an Eastern Conference non-threat, they still faced a true challenge and had to climb their way out of it.
When their formula for success is stunted or rivaled, they still found a way to adjust, or find new ways to get those same high-value looks that put them up big in the first place. On both ends of the floor, in a contest that was shaping up
