Tag: boston celtics basketball

Photos of Jrue Holiday from Eastern Conference Finals

Jrue Holiday was fantastic in the Eastern Conference Finals series against the Indiana Pacers.

It was a tremendous week for Jrue Holiday and his Boston Celtics. The Celtics swept the four-game series against the Indiana Pacers and now are ready for the NBA Finals.

The Celtics guard, who was traded from Milwaukee in the off-season played 38 minutes in the Game 4 win and scored 17 points. He also recorded 9 rebounds in the game. Holiday averaged 40 minutes a night in the series and scored 17.5 points per game.

The big game for Holiday was in Game 1 when he scored a postseason-high 28 points and played a game-high 48 minutes. Jaylen Brown was named the Eastern Conference Finals MVP.

While Boston awaits the series winner in the Western Conference between the Dallas Mavericks, enjoy some photos of the former UCLA Bruins star in the Eastern Conference Finals:

Jrue Holiday takes over in Celtics Game 3 Win

Jrue had a special series.

It has been quite a series for Jrue Holiday, the former UCLA Bruins basketball guard. After scoring a playoff-high 28 points in Game 1, and then recording a double-double with 15 points and 10 rebounds in Game 2, he had another massive impact in Game 3.

As a Pascal Siakam miss, Jaylen Brown rebounded, got the ball to Jayson Tatum, who got it to Holiday for a driving lay-up, and the foul. The lay-up tied the game, and the free throw put the Celtics up 1 with 0:38 to go. After a defensive stop, and a miss on the other end, Holiday then got a steal with 0:03 to go. He was fouled and buried the final two free throws of the game.

Scoring the final 6 points of the game, put Holiday at 14 for the game. He also recorded 9 rebounds and 3 assists. Holiday also had 3 steals in the game.

The Celtics won the game 114-111 over the Pacers before going on to sweep the Pacers.

Holiday is in his first season with the Celtics after being traded by Milwaukee this off-season. The 33-year-old played in 69 games for the Celtics. He was the 17th overall pick back in the 2009 draft out of UCLA.

Photos of Jrue Holiday from 2nd round NBA Playoffs series vs. Cavs

Photos of Jrue from the 2nd round playoff win.

Jrue Holiday, a former UCLA star guard had a huge impact in the five-game series win for the Boston Celtics in the second round. Holiday scored double digits in four of the five games, including 13 in the deciding Game 5 win.

Holiday played 41 minutes in the Game 5 win, adding 3 rebounds and 4 assists. His best game of the series was in Game 3, where he scored 18 points, dished out 5 assists, and ripped down 8 rebounds.

Now, the former UCLA guard will take on the Indiana Pacers in the Eastern Conference Finals. This will be a series of the highest-scoring teams in the Eastern Conference. The series starts in Boston on May 21st.

The Knicks outlast the Celtics 138-134 in a 2OT opening-night thriller

The Celtics mount a furious comeback, but fall short in New York on opening night

While the Madison Square Garden environment felt more like a May matchup than an October meeting, both the Celtics (0-1) and Knicks (1-0) showed their early-season legs late in a frantic double-OT finish. Ultimately, Julius Randle and Evan Fournier outlasted the Celtics in a 138-134 thriller after Boston mounted a furious comeback to force overtime.

Following a Fournier three with 58 seconds left, the Celtics trailed 112-106 in a game that felt over following a Knicks third-quarter surge. After a Grant Williams layup cut the lead to four, the Celtics came up with a steal and Robert Williams III converted on a pair of free throws.

Jaylen Brown had three of his game-high 46 points from the parking lot to put the pressure on New York late.

A wild sequence and inexplicably poor defense from the Knicks gave Marcus Smart a wide open three-point look at the buzzer which he drained to force overtime.

The overtime session began with both teams connecting on their first four shots from the field. Brown scored four of the first five Celtics points to begin the extra period, while Fournier poured in three straight threes for the Knicks. After trading blows, it was Jayson Tatum with the final look. The Celtics star could not connect on a difficult 15-footer as Boston headed to a second overtime on opening night.

Tatum struggled with his shot all night long, finishing 7-30 from the field and just 2-15 from three-point range. He would end the night with 20 points and 11 rebounds.

The second overtime saw Fournier with yet another answer for New York, as his sixth three gave the Knicks a 136-134 lead with under a minute remaining. The Frenchman finished with 32 points in his Knick debut.

Before there was double-overtime craziness at Madison Square Garden, the Celtics built a six-point first-quarter lead behind hot shooting early. Late in the third-quarter, a scoring flurry from RJ Barrett and Obi Toppin turned a seven-point Celtics lead into a four-point Knicks lead by the end of the period.

In the end, both teams were playing on tired legs in the overtime sessions as the Knicks were able to knock down a few more late jumpers.

It was an incredible Boston comeback to force the overtime session, but the Knicks showed the resilience that defined them a year ago in the opening win.

The Celtics will have to fight

A youthful Celtics group falls to Magic on last-second drama in penultimate preseason game

The Celtics fall to the Magic on a last-second jumper by Jeff Dowtin Jr. as Aaron Nesmith impresses

On Wednesday night in Orlando, the Celtics trotted out a starting lineup that you won’t see throughout the regular season. In their second to last preseason game, Ime Udoka and crew gave the keys to the youth as Boston rested most of their veterans.

Orlando’s youngsters outlasted Boston’s down the stretch, as a Jeff Dowtin Jr. jumper with less than a second left gave the Magic a 103-102 win.

The early Celtics offense ran through Payton Pritchard, who cruised to 10 first-half points. Late in the second quarter, Pritchard was inadvertently hit in the nose by Ignas Brazdeikis and eventually ruled out for the remainder of the night.

After starring in NBA Summer League, Aaron Nesmith led the way again for Boston offensively. The Vanderbilt product finished with 23 points on 8-for-16 shooting while pouring in four threes. Led by Nesmith, Pritchard, and early Jabari Parker scoring, the Celtics jumped out to a 56-54 halftime lead.

Boston built a nine-point lead early in the fourth quarter, but the end of the night belonged to the Magic youth. Second-year pro Dowtin Jr. finished off the Celtics with the moment of his young NBA career:

R.J. Hampton led the Magic off the bench, finishing with a team-high 20 points on 6-for-10 shooting. Dowtin Jr. added 10, while Wendell Carter Jr. poured in 13 points for Orlando.

The Celtics dropped to 2-1 in preseason, and face Miami on Friday in their final test before the regular season begins.

WATCH: What will be the Celtics playing style this season?

With leadership changes, what will Boston’s playing style look like this season?

The Celtics’ summer, as it feels like it does for nearly all teams in the modern era of NBA basketball, featured significant turnover.

While Boston brought in new faces on the court, the biggest news of the summer came in the front office. With president of basketball operations Danny Ainge retiring in early June and Brad Stevens taking his place, Ime Udoka became the new head coach.

With Udoka, there will likely be slight tweaks but no systemic overhaul. While losing Kemba Walker to the Knicks, Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown will once again be the offensive core.

As the Celtics adjust to a new coach and the additions of guard Dennis Schroeder, wing Josh Richardson and familiar face Al Horford, among others, what will Boston’s identity look like? Celtics All Access on CLNS talked through a renewed emphasis on pace, their defensive identity and the evolution of Marcus Smart and Jayson Tatum:

Paul Pierce on his fallout with ESPN: ‘You have to talk about LeBron all the time’

In a new SI exclusive with Chris Mannix, Paul Pierce details his fallout with ESPN

On Tuesday, another chapter was added to the extremely public feud between Paul Pierce and ESPN.

Chris Mannix of Sports Illustrated sat down with Pierce to talk through his NBA career, NBA Hall of Fame induction, and, of course, his breakup with ESPN following an Instagram Live that went off the rails. While the Instagram video may have been the catalyst towards sending Pierce packing, the ESPN relationship with the former Celtics star had been deteriorating for months according to Mannix’s piece:

The relationship between Pierce and the network had become strained over the past two years. Pierce hated the travel. Network executives didn’t think he was working hard enough. The video, industry sources told Sports Illustrated, was the last straw. “I was done with them, anyway,” says Pierce between pulls of lemon mint. “It wasn’t a great fit. There’s a lot of stuff over there that you can’t say. And you have to talk about LeBron all the time.”

Not only was their a feud surrounding logistics of travel, scheduling, and Pierce’s other commitments, but the content he was forced to discuss didn’t appeal to the 2008 NBA champion. LeBron James, understandably so, dominates headlines at all major networks surrounding the NBA and basketball.

Whether it’s his legacy, injuries, teaming up with other stars in large markets, or making deep playoff runs, James will be at the forefront of basketball discourse until his retirement. While Pierce was a fierce rival of James’ during the Boston days, he also heaped praise on him throughout his stint with ESPN. Apparently it got to be too much talking about “The King” for Pierce’s liking.

WATCH: Jaylen Brown drops 24 points to help lead Celtics to a win at Portland (4/13)

Jaylen Brown helps lead the Celtics to a key win

The Boston Celtics are suddenly playing arguably the best basketball of their season as a late win over Portland gave Boston their fourth win in a row.

While Jayson Tatum led the way with 32 points and a clutch dagger jumper, Jaylen Brown pitched in with a necessary 24-point night to go along with four rebounds and a pair of assists while logging 40 minutes.

Courtesy of Tomasz Kordylewski on YouTube, here is a look at how Brown was able to score at all three levels to lead the Celtics in Portland:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sJG_rZjdmK0

Detroit takes down the Celtics 108-102 on Saddiq Bey’s career night

The Pistons outlast the Celtics at the Garden

The Celtics looked like a team on the second night of a back-to-back as the third quarter proved to be the difference at TD Garden. Friday night saw Boston continue to struggle with a Detroit Pistons team that outlasted the tired Celtics (13-12) for a 108-102 win.

Detroit (7-19) continued their enigmatic start to the year, which has seen a number of terrible losses mixed in with wins over the NBA’s cream of the crop. The Pistons have now beaten the Celtics in two out of their three meetings this year, and have wins over the likes of the Lakers, Nets, and 76ers.

Coming off of an impressive 120-106 win on Thursday night over Toronto, Boston was ripe for a classic NBA letdown game. Rookie sharpshooter Saddiq Bey made sure that’s exactly how the night went.

The Villanova product splashed home a career-high 30 points to go along with 7 made threes. It was all Bey all the time, including in crunch time when he nailed a dagger three to give Detroit a 101-95 lead with 38 seconds left. The Pistons nearly doubled up Boston from distance as Detroit finished with 15 three-point makes compared to just 8 for the home team.

It was a third quarter where Boston couldn’t find their offense that ended up being the difference. The Celtics scored just 20 points in the period, as Detroit won the quarter by 8 and took a ten point lead into the final frame.

While Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown combined for 60 of Boston’s 102, the Celtics couldn’t get the necessary stops down the stretch to close the gap.

The Celtics have a chance to right the ship against the last place team in the east in Washington with a Sunday road matinee.

 

Donovan Mitchell and Rudy Gobert overwhelm the Celtics in the 2H, Jazz defeat Boston 122-108

The Jazz scorch the Celtics in the 2H en route to a double-digit win

The Boston Celtics looked like a team at the end of a treacherous five-game western conference road trip on Tuesday night. They also ran into the hottest team in the NBA in Utah. The Jazz used a 42-32 third quarter to stretch a one point halftime lead to 11 after three quarters. While a tired Boston team tried to make a push, it never got closer than 4 in the final quarter as Utah pulled away for a 122-108 victory.

Taking the Celtics glasses off for a moment, the Jazz deserved a ton of the credit for how the final score looked. Sure, Brad Stevens won’t be happy with the pick-and-roll defense and the attention to shooters at times, but Quin Snyder and the Jazz are playing like a team that believes they are contenders. Over the last few weeks, they’ve turned doubters into believers.

The Jazz picked up their league-leading 20th win with a lethal combination of timely threes and interior defense, while outrebounding the Celtics by six. Rudy Gobert looked like the NBA Defensive Player of the Year frontrunner, altering shots left and right while living up his “Stifle Tower” nickname. The Frenchman finished with 18 points on 8-9 from the field, most of which came off of pick-and-roll slams. He also tacked on a game-high 12 rebounds.

Donovan Mitchell came in as the closer, as he often does for the western conference leaders. The former Louisville star scored or assisted on the final 10 Jazz points, while finishing with a game-high 36 points.

While he may not end up on SportsCenter every night, Joe Ingles once again put in an excellent shift at the office. The Australian was a pick-and-roll maestro, conducting Gobert and wreaking havoc on a Celtics team that struggled to stop the duo. Ingles not only found threes in pick-and-roll but also in transition, including an early dagger to put Utah up 111-104 with 3 minutes left. He finished with 24 key points on the night.

For the Celtics, it felt as though the tail end of a five-game road trip against the western conference’s best resulted in tired legs down the stretch. Jaylen Brown returned to the lineup after missing two straight games with knee soreness and he continued to play at an all-star level. Scoring 9 of the games first 11 points, he finished with a team-high 33 points on an efficient 12-20 night from the field.

For Boston, surprise offensive production came from Daniel Theis, who caught fire with five made threes on six tries to end up with 15 points. The German fouled out with 5:23 left and the Celtics down 5 in what proved to be a true dagger. With Theis, Boston could stretch Gobert out of the lane and have a fighting chance at the rim. With Tristan Thompson? Not so much.

Ultimately, Utah’s two stars were the best players on the floor in the fourth quarter as the Jazz looked fresh in Salt Lake City.

The good news for the 12-11 Celtics is that they finally return home to the friendly confines of TD Garden on Thursday to battle Toronto.