Boston Celtics continue to bet on historical triple production
No team in the NBA history writes and launches more triple than these Celtics, but did the defenders arrive at a point of decreasing yields?
The onslaught began just 12 seconds after starting the season.
It was October 22 in Boston (Night of celebration of the title for the defenders champions Celtics against renewed New York Knicks rivals) and Jayson Tatum He had just scored a triple open from the right wing in the first play of the game.
During the next 11:48 minutes of play, Boston He scored nine more triples: To Horford From the wing. Derrick White From the corner. Jaylen Brown From the wing. Tatum again, and again, and again. Jrue Holiday. Sam Hauser. And finally, Payton Pritchard With less than 30 seconds in the first quarter (because, of course, he scored them).
They were the first 10 of the 29 triples that matched the NBA record that the Celtics They would score against the Knicks that night, in the first 39 minutes of the game.
But the attempt to Boston To break the record, matched only by the Milwaukee Bucks of 2020-21, it became a show in itself during the last nine minutes of the 132-109 victory.
Brown tried to make history in the league, like Hauser, Pritchard and the rarely used alternates Xavier Tillman and Jordan Walsh. In total, the Celtics They launched and failed 13 triples to close an performance of 29 of 61 from beyond the arch.
The performance was a sign of what awaits Bostonboth in the number of long balls that will launch this season and in the problems in which the champions can be put when the shots stop entering. Last week, in their victory over the Miami Heat, the Celtics registered their 23rd season game with at least 50 triple attempts. That is already a NBA record, a feat that they achieved before reaching the recess of the stars game. And before Thursday’s game against the philadelphia 76ers (7 pm et, tnt in the USA), The Celtics are on their way to erase the record of a league season, 48.3 per game.
But with its attempts 14% more than last season (yes, Boston He also led the league in that season) and a disconcerting and not impressive section of two months before the recess, in which the Celtics They had difficulties from the outside, in an unusual way, the question of whether their possibilities of repeating as champions are reinforced or hindered by their historic and blatant triple strategy is raised.
Of a month The next, the triple numbers of the Celtics They collapsed.
A fantastic 40.7% from the three -point line in October. A solid 36.7% mark in November. But then 35.4%, below the average, in December, which followed 33.8% frankly bad (which would locate them near the end of the NBA in the season) until the first half of January.
The decrease in shots coincided with (and possibly caused) the fall of the Celtics in the column of victories and defeats. Boston The campaign began dominant with a 16-3 mark. But although the group continued playing a first level defense, the Celtics They looked mortal around the parties, with an 8-6 record in December before registering a 5-4 mark to start 2025.
They lost consecutive games for the first time throughout the season at the end of December, losing to an Orlando Magic team that did not have the emerging stars Paolo Banchero and Franz Wagner before falling at home against a team of Sixers that staggered at Christmas. Meanwhile, the Cleveland Cavaliers, 5½ games ahead of the Celtics for the first place in the east before Thursday, looked like the best of the conference during the first half of the season.
Of the 10 defeats of Boston Since mid -December, the Celtics They have triggered 30% or less from the arc in seven of them, which underlines the impact of perimeter difficulties.
“We are playing an inconsistent basketball,” said coach Joe Mazzulla, who has argued for a long time that he is less concerned about the amount of triple that his team gets and more concerned about their quality. Last month, the pivot Kristaps porzingis He recognized something that NBA players rarely do: the current champions, who occupied the second place in a percentage of triples last season, have allowed their bad streaks in the shot to affect their defensive effort and decision making in attack in attack in attack in occasions.
“If we are not scoring, that begins to wear a bit. And then we have 5 or 10 percent less effort in defense. Someone makes a bad shot, or I make a hurried shot or whatever. We simply have to be aware of those moments, ”said Porzingis. “But still (we need) to throw the ball, because we are a great shooting team. We simply have to be intelligent about it. ”
There is at least one statistical indication that the attempts of the Celtics From the outside they were considerably worse during their bad streak, as Porzingis suggested. The quantified shooting quality (QSQ) of Bostonan advanced Second Spectrum metric that measures the probability that a shot between the location and the closest defenders fell 17 positions, 10th. In the NBA to 27mo. in the 16 games between December 19 and January 18.
However, Celtics believe in silence that they may have grown during that mediocre period of one month during the Christmas holidays.
For anyone who believes in the possibilities of Boston To repeat, there are many reasons to feel good about it.
The general metrics of the team seem almost the same as last season. The defense, known for its ability to stop opponents during the race for the 2024 title, remains one of the five best units and defends better than any equipment in transition scenarios.
And despite all criticism and the focus on the offensive, Celtics (which, after a solid three -week streak in field shots, now occupy the 11th place in a percentage of triples) are still excellent in isolation and rarely lose the ball. They occupy the fourth place in annotation efficiency, even with the periods of drought from outside. Tatumin particular, he has reached where he wants on the court, surpassing the defenders with a percentage of 36%, the best of the NBA. In addition to getting his points, he is producing assists at a record rate in his career (5.6 assists per game) and 61% of his assists have been to three -point shooters, the second highest rate in the league.
When comparing opponents and measuring how it has gone to Boston Against elite defenses, things look even better. The Celtics They have registered the second best efficiency of the NBA against defensive units of the 10 best, only behind the cavaliers in the category, a surprising figure considering that Boston He had a poor performance in the second half of a defeat against Oklahoma City Thunder last month, registering a total of 27 points and launching only 3 of 24 in triples.
“You have to accept the good and the bad and understand that, in the future, we can be grateful for this streak,” he said Tatum In January. “We fail shots that we normally make at a higher pace that would stop bleeding in this streak. We are still trying to generate the right shot and put the players in the right places. We are simply not throwing the ball as well as we normally do. ”
Now, with the Celtics 5-1 In February and 10-3 since January 20, Tatum’s comments seem sensible, if not prophetic.
This does not mean that things are completely resolved, even when the team shows an improvement and is on the way to achieving 57 victories, according to the Basketball Power Index of AM850.
Perhaps the strangest change of last season to this: the titular alignment, so dominant a year ago, it is not working so well statistically. The alignment of five men formed by Tatum, Brown, Porzingis, White and Holiday crush.
The most notable data: that group has had great difficulties since depth with 33.8% in the season, below 39.3% of last season. On the contrary, that group with veteran Horford instead of Porzingis has been dominant this season, largely due to its percentage of 45% from beyond the arch.
It is another decisive example of the historical dependence of Boston in the triple.
Yes, they have shown that they can be cold and lose important matches by launching so many of them. But after winning everything a season ago, the Celtics They have also seen the maximum reward of playing precisely as they do, with up to 50 triples per night. To the devil with stylistic criticisms.
