Tag: Jaylen Brown

Jaylen Brown looking forward to next matchup against Kyrie Irving

If anyone was bothered by Kyrie Irving last season, it was Boston Celtics wing Jaylen Brown

Not to say that it came as a surprise to anyone but if you didn’t already know, recently departed Kyrie Irving — who left the Boston Celtics after proclaiming his desire to re-sign with the team prior to the season — won’t be suiting up for the Nets when they travel to Boston to face a team now led by Kemba Walker.

Actually, Irving won’t even be traveling with the team, so Celtics fans wouldn’t even be able to berate him with the boos they’ve kept welled up inside since his decision to team up with injured All-Star Kevin Durant in Brooklyn.

That’s good for Irving and it takes away what would have been a distraction from the actual game but still, there’s no doubt that fans worldwide — whether they’re fans of Boston’s illustrious franchise or not — wanted to see Irving return to the arena housing a locker room full of players that he seemed to rub the wrong way with an abrasive and detached attitude last season.

Just as he had rubbed the Celtics fans the wrong way with his fickleness and paltry performance in the postseason and how he rubbed the Celtics media wrong with his combativeness during pressers.

If anyone was bothered by Irving’s antics last season, it was Celtics swingman Jaylen Brown, who has inexplicably thrived in the All-Star guards absence. As they’ve added another All-Star to replace him, Gordon Hayward has resembled his All-Star self and they’ve added a score-first guard to replace balanced backup Terry Rozier, it goes against logic that Brown could have more opportunity and a greater impact this season but he has.

Part of it is simply Brown improving as a ball-handled and the game slowing down for him, making him more effective as a slasher. However, he’s playing more free and confident than he was last year, which is in part due to there being a question of how to mesh Irving and Hayward’s return with the rise of Brown, Rozier and Jayson Tatum but also in part due to the atmosphere that surrounds the team.

One that’s much lighter. More jovial. More conducive to bonding and team chemistry.

Comparing Walker’s good-natured persona and humility to Irving’s enigmatic character and bravado, one could see how the team’s new floor general is better equipped to lead a young team whose confidence and mood will be effected by the messages and emotional state of their leader.

Still, the two seemed to develop an interesting connection — one you might even consider a friendship — before their relationship deteriorated in front of everyone’s eyes in the second season as teammates. That said, Brown’s thoughts on Irving are particularly intriguing, which is why he was asked his thoughts about Irving missing their upcoming game.

Appearing to not know before being asked, Brown is nonchalant in his answer, saying “Oh well. We’ll catch him next time then” (per MassLive’s Tom Westerholm).

Expounding upon that statement, Brown says:

“Obviously he’s a great player for them and makes their team better, despite what they probably say. But it would’ve been nice, it would’ve been great to compete against a former teammate. Those are always fun.”

It’s difficult to mine any deep meaning from Brown’s statement other than he’s clearly moved on from last season’s chaos and that he’s genuinely looking forward to playing against his former teammate.

Whether that’s because he wants to try and make a statement with Irving on the floor, get a chance to be physical with him on the court or because he just likes the way those games can provide an emotional charge is unknown.

Maybe he’s even looking forward to burying the hatchet and chatting with his former pal. It wouldn’t be the first time it’s happened in the league.

What is known though is that when the Nets come to town, Boston will be ready and hope to make a point against Irving’s team whether he’s on the floor or not.

There’s no better way to prove that a former teammate picked the lesser team than by outplaying them.

Feisty Celtics survive 41 points from white-hot Hield, win 103-102

The Boston Celtics survived the Buddy Hield show thanks to Jaylen Brown, Jayson Tatum and Marcus Smart.

Although they couldn’t seem to contain Sacramento Kings guard Buddy Hield, who unleashed canned a career-high 11 threes against the Boston Celtics en route to a 41-point night, the Celtics would trade baskets with the Kings for much of the game and lean on strong performances from Jaylen Brown, Jayson Tatum and Marcus Smart to pull out a narrow win (103-102) over their Western Conference foes.

The trio scored 61 of the team’s points, good for 59.2% of the total, with each continuing to do the things that had made them successful on offense to this point in the season.

With Brown attacking the rim and using his explosiveness to his advantage, Tatum showing off his combination of footwork and shooting touch and Smart finding the mark with a series of runners and floaters, Boston was able to keep up with Sacramento’s Bohemian baller.

However, it still took two clutch shots from Smart at the end of the game — and a defensive play by Robert Williams III on the final possession — for the Celtics to secure the win while shorthanded.

With star guard Kemba Walker sidelined with a neck sprain and starting center Daniel Theis out with an illness, Smart would start at point guard and make a number of plays as a scorer and facilitator on his way to 17 points (on 7-12 shooting) and seven assists.

Kanter, though unable to defend on the perimeter as well as Theis and contributing to the reason Hield was able to be open on a couple of plays, bullied Kings center in the post on his way to 13 points (and nine rebounds).

As exciting of a game as it was for Celtics fans, the most riveting experience was the NBA debut of rookie point guard Tremont Waters. Seemingly already beloved by the locker room, community and Celtics head coach Brad Stevens, Waters had a rough night shooting the ball but consistently showed off his basketball IQ.

Waters — whom Brown has nicknamed “Young Oldhead” to highlight his on-court savvy, finished the night with seven points (on 2-7 shooting from the field), three assists, one steal, two blocks and two turnovers in 19 minutes.

The Celtics may have Walker back for their next game, as the guard could have potentially played against the Kings had Boston not wanted to take precaution.

However, the team that they’ll be facing — the Brooklyn Nets — will be missing a familiar face in star guard Kyrie Irving, which makes the game easier to win but nullifies some of the emotional energy that would surround it.

Ranking the Boston Celtics’ first-round draft picks in this decade

The Boston Celtics have drafted some of the most notable players in the league in the last few years.

The Boston Celtics were able to add some key players through first-round selections. However, all of their picks in the first round did not pan out the way they hoped.

2013: Lucas Noguiera

Jeremy Brevard-USA TODAY Sports

Well, at least the Celtics were smart enough to draft this project and then send him to the Raptors. Unfortunately, part of that deal saw Lou Williams also go to Toronto for John Salmons and a 2015 second-round pick. The seven-foot Noguiera somehow has played in more playoff games (13) than regular-season contests (10). He’s back in Spain now, a bad pick and a good player to rid yourself of, quickly

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Danny Ainge not opposed to giving Kyrie Irving tribute video upon return

Should Kyrie Irving receive a tribute video when the Brooklyn Nets visit the Boston Celtics on Nov. 27.

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While seemingly everyone else in Boston will bring out the pitchforks for Kyrie Irving’s potential return to TD Garden on Nov. 27, don’t expect Boston Celtics president and general manager Danny Ainge to join in the mob mentality, opting for a more balanced view of Irving’s time with the franchise.

When asked by “The Toucher and Rich Show” hosts Fred Toettcher and Rich Shertenlieb about the possibility of giving Irving a tribute video — what has become a common gesture around the league for certain players upon their return to a former team — Ainge didn’t balk at the possibility.

“Sure… He gets blamed for a lot of the sour last year,” says Ainge (per Boston.com), “and I just think it’s much, much bigger than that. I don’t have any grudges against Kyrie.

For all the abrasiveness, detachment, disengagement and even selfishness that Irving displayed last year — issues that reared their ugly head in the locker room, in the media and on the court —the issue extended past Irving in that he was far from the only reason Boston fell short of expectations.

With Gordon Hayward’s return, there was a natural push-and-pull — or power struggle, if you will — that placed pressure on the core players to find a way to mesh and they were slow to, even needing both Hayward and Jaylen Brown to come off the bench so that Irving and Jayson Tatum could act as their 1-2 punch.

At this point, though the Celtics saw steady improvement from Hayward and Brown as they season progressed, there was already growing frustration on the part of Brown.

He’s recently admitted to being concerned about his lack of opportunity in 2018-19 with his contract extension approaching and being demoted to the bench, rather than suggesting he come off the bench like Hayward did, has a different effect on the psyche as well.

Speaking of Brown, his tiffs with Irving — whose opinions he openly questioned — further damaged the chemistry he was trying to salvage in an ironic sort of way.

Not to be forgotten, backup point guard Terry Rozier was struggling after playing like a high-level starter in the 2018 NBA Playoffs. As he would say during the season, he sacrificed more than any other player on the team, and while he kept his head down and stayed out of the headlines (for anything unrelated to his performance on the court) it’s obvious that he too was frustrated throughout the season.

That’s at least three of the team’s top six players (counting Tatum, Hayward, Marcus Smart) who were clearly frustrated with by their own situations, although there was interconnection.

If Irving revealing that he was grieving from the passing of his grandfather holds any weight, perhaps Boston’s inability to identify his behavior was out of character — particularly after having multiple players whose experienced losses to loved ones in recent years (Smart, Isaiah Thomas and Jae Crowder) — should also be explored.

As Ainge said, the issue was far more complex than the amalgamation of Irving’s character flaws causing Boston to miss the playoffs.

Though it was ugly off the court for the six-time All-Star last season and maybe even uglier against the Milwaukee Bucks in the postseason, Irving has had many positive moments that showed he may in fact be growing as a leader in his first season.

While more or less taking former backup Terry Rozier under his wing during the 2018 NBA Playoffs while he was out with a surgery to deal with a bacterial infection, he also developed a strong relationship with young forward Jayson Tatum which is important for players planning to be one of the league’s dynamic duos.

He was also coachable, adhering to Stevens’ wishes to put efforts into areas of his game that he had previously not been not a focus for him, like defense and facilitating, even recording a career-high in assists per game last season (6.9). That, if nothing else, is how good leaders can lead by example on the court.

Though Ainge is unsure if Irving will receive a tribute video, it would be a kind gesture from the Celtics that would help put to bed a relatively threadbare narrative. There would be plenty of highlights to pull together if so.

However, that’s only if Irving actually comes to Boston, whether he’s healthy enough to play or not.

Despite the buzz about Boston, don’t expect trades any time soon

Dubbed “the spiritual successors to the Warriors”, will the Boston Celtics iteration of switchy defenders and high-powered offense be enough to succeed in the postseason?

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Don’t expect a trade to upgrade the Boston Celtics coming any time soon, particularly while the team sticks to its winning ways.

Coming into the season, the team’s big man rotation was widely seen to be a step below what the team would need to compete for a title, with larger, more skilled big men on the Philadelphia 76ers and Milwaukee Bucks looking like insuperable barriers to a deep postseason run.

One 10-game win streak later and those qualms have subsided significantly, particularly with Boston showing it could bounce back against the equally-surprising Phoenix Suns and former center Aron Baynes on Nov. 18.

There’s still legitimate reason to doubt the team’s current frontcourt will have what it takes to get past some of the better teams in the playoffs, where opponents will have more time and impetus to gameplan ways to use size against the team.

As the Ringer’s Jonathan Tjarks notes, the Celtics elevation of two third-overall picks (in consecutive NBA Drafts), Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum, to trusted top offensive options and combining them defensive tour de force Marcus Smart (who can switch onto even the strongest and quickest bigs in the league) has somehow worked.

And not only worked, but created one of the more potent offensive two-man lineups in the league despite Tatum’s up-and-down nights and overall development.

“The Celtics are this year’s closest thing to the spiritual heirs of the Warriors,” explains Tjarks.

“They don’t have the same star power, but their key players all fit into similar roles. Kemba Walker, like Steph Curry, is a smaller guard who can bomb 3s and play on and off the ball, and they surround him with big wings who can defend multiple positions, space the floor, and create their own shot. Their best lineup, when everyone is healthy, doesn’t feature anyone above 6-foot-8: Kemba, Smart, Tatum, Brown, and Hayward.”

Tatum’s showing signs of putting things together and considering much of this has been going on without All-Star forward Gordon Hayward — out until December with a broken hand — while Kemba Walker has quietly inserted himself into the fringes of the MVP conversation.

Perhaps the wins shouldn’t be so surprising.

But the skepticism about the frontcourt remains, and quite possibly for good reason. While the Warriors indeed did not have a dominant big functioning in a rim-protecting, pick-setting, back-to-the-basket sort of center anchoring their formidable defenses, they also had a much more lethal array of shooters, arguably the greatest ever assembled in recent years.

Can Boston hope to compete for a title with such a notable step down on the offensive end? If not, is there a player who makes sense who could be had on the trade market?

According to senior ESPN writer Brian Windhorst, if there is, it won’t involve any core players — Walker, Hayward, Jaylen Brown, Jayson Tatum or even Marcus Smart — from the team’s core. Smart and Hayward have been floated often as potential options in recent months.

That leaves the comparatively smaller salaries of players like veterans like Daniel Theis, Enes Kanter, and rookies Romeo Langford and Vincent Poirier, all of whom make $5 million per season or less, and all but Langford happen to be bigs shoring up the already- shaky frontcourt rotation.

Finding a player worth moving so many contracts (or on a deal so cheap) that makes sense to pull the trigger on will be no easy task and with so many new signings for the team in the offseason, any such deal would likely have to wait until at least Dec. 15, when certain recently-signed deals begin to become tradable according to league rules.

For now, the strategy of the “spiritual heirs of the Warriors” will be to refine and evolve the Dubs approach to winning while small, strangely zagging back to what’s worked in the past as East contemporaries ‘zig’ big.

Will it be enough to stay in the conversation of belonging in the league’s elite?

We’ll just have to wait to find out.

ESPN expert cites stat that’s been key to Celtics’ early success

Jaylen Brown may be more beneficial to the Boston Celtics’ offense than anyone thought.

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At 11-2, the Boston Celtics have the Eastern Conference’s best record and they’ve done so while being ranked in the league’s top-10 of both offensive rating (110.9; 4th in the NBA) and defensive rating (102.6; 6th in the NBA). That they’ve been able to dominate on offense, rather than defense — where the most questions were raised — is unsurprising.

However, they’ve done so with star forward Gordon Hayward — playing his best basketball in years — missing five games and both Jayson Tatum and Kemba Walker shooting below 42% from the floor. Their bench hasn’t been of much help offensively either, as they continue to be ranked near the bottom of the league in points per game (26.9; 28th in the NBA).

Making an appearance on ESPN’s Brian’s Windhorst’s “Brian Windhorst & the Hoop Collective” podcast with Windhorst and ESPN’s Kevin Arnovitz, ESPN’s Kevin Pelton has an interesting thought on what’s been a primary catalyst for Boston’s early offensive success.

According to Pelton, the Celtics would have to look no further than to keep the ball in their possession, as it would lead to them getting more shot opportunities (h/t NESN’s Marcus Kwesi O’Mard):

“The thing that has really driven their offense, much more so than their shot-making, has been their ability to take care of the basketball,” he said. “They’re middle of the pack in 12th in terms of effective field goal percentage on offense but they are no. 1 in turnover percentage. And they are No. 1 by a wide margin. The gap between them and the No. 2 team, which is Orlando, is larger than the gap between Orlando and the 11th team in the league.

So they’re just never turning it over, and that’s a quality we don’t think about that much in associating it with elite offenses. We think more about shot-making. But if you get attempts at the basket, that’s going to help your chances.”

The Celtics have the league’s best turnover rate at 12.2%, with the Denver Nuggets and Orlando Magic right behind them at 13.2%. Currently, the gap between the turnover rate of the Nuggets and Magic and that of the team with the 11th-ranked turnover rate, the Houston Rockets, is 1.2%.

That said, while Boston is no longer in another stratosphere with their ball control, they still lead the league in an important category. One that Pelton rightly assesses as a reason that their middling effective field goal percentage (eFG) — ranked 17th in the NBA at 51.4% — hasn’t prevented them from achieving an 11-2 record to start the season.

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Furthermore, the Celtics ranked 13th in the NBA with 90.3 field goal attempts per game (tied with the Golden State Warriors). Among the top 13 teams, only six average more than 15.0 turnovers per game and out of the seven averaging fewer, five are currently in the top-8 of their conference standings.

There could certainly be a direct correlation between their low turnover rate and their team record.

Each of center Daniel Theis (47.4%), forward Jayson Tatum (46.8%), guard Carsen Edwards (42.9%) and forward Grant Williams (29.7%) have underwhelmed from the floor, with Edwards, Theis and Williams struggling from behind the arc and Tatum unable to find the mark from inside it.

Logic would suggest that talented scorers like Edwards and Tatum will turn it around.

However, while they try to catch their rhythm, Boston is certainly benefiting from their ability to take care of the ball. Tatum is particularly helpful in this regard, with a turnover rate of 8.8% despite a usage rate of 27.3%. Edwards (6.2%) also does well in this category though Williams has a glaring turnover rate of 20.3%, the third-highest of their team.

The team’s best player — in terms of efficiency, scoring, usage rate and turnover rate — may be Jaylen Brown though.

Averaging 19.5 points (along with 7.3 rebounds) on 49.7% shooting from the field and 39.0% shooting from three, Brown’s eFG of 55.0% is ranked second among the team’s starters (behind the injured Gordon Hayward’s sizzling eFG of 61.4%). His turnover rate of 8.7% is also lower than Tatum’s while his usage rate of 24.2% isn’t too far behind the Duke product’s either

Moving forward, the Celtics should expect better efficiency from Tatum and Edwards, especially if Tatum cuts down on the number of tough shots he takes from midrange. Combining improved efficiency, exceptional defense and ball control, Boston could remain atop the Eastern Conference standings for quite some time.

*All stats gathered from NBA Advanced Stats and Basketball Reference 

A tale of 2 Jays: While Jaylen Brown exceeds expectations, Jayson Tatum struggles

In a season defying expectations of all sorts, Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum are confounding experts in nearly every way possible.

In the NBA, narratives can turn on a dime.

It seems like eons ago that we were collectively certain the Boston Celtics would be mostly treading water against the league’s better teams while doing well against the middle-of-the-pack and cellar-dweller franchises of the league.

In truth, it hasn’t even been a month to see that and many such expectations upended.

The same groupthink that had us all thinking last season’s Celtics would dominate the NBA had many assuming Jaylen Brown would probably be dealt by the end of the season, given how unlikely it was that he’d manage to grow enough as a player to warrant the near-max deal he’d likely garner at the end of the 2019-20 season.

Many believed this was the season Jayson Tatum would take a big step forward, cementing his place among the league’s top players, particularly after word his game had been “de-Kobe-fied” (whatever that means) started circulating.

Fast forward 3.5 weeks and Boston is coming off of the first loss after a 10-game winning streak behind some of the most consistent play of Brown’s career (including several wins over likely playoff teams), while third-year wing Tatum has struggled to put together the sort of leaps in production many had hoped to see this season.

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If nothing else, we should use this state of affairs to acknowledge just how complex things like chemistry and other contexts largely invisible to — or at least difficult to stay aware of — can impact assumptions about players and the teams they populate can have.

The Celtics have, if anything, in recent years been a sterling example of how popular narratives do not always line up with our expected results.

The cascading effects of divergent interests last season has illustrated how too much talent is indeed a thing one can have, if said talent isn’t properly distributed across the roster or able to effectively communicate.

And for at least the second time in his young career, Brown had to watch his stock drop just before a key career juncture due to his team not having the structure to amplify his strengths. Meanwhile, Tatum has yet to consistently attack on offense with the matured approach we instead are seeing from the other half of the so-called Jay Team.

What’s behind the unexpected (at least, by some) success of the former and shortcomings of the latter?

Quite possibly, something as simple as the irregular development curve shown by most rookies, who rarely make jumps in a linear fashion.

It could also simply be the current lack of high-level bigs and Brown’s propensity to guard rangier forwards on one end of the floor and opportunity relatively unmarred by injury on the other to explain the Georgia native’s newfound success.

Many have noted that the vote of confidence Celtics president Danny Ainge granted in signing the fourth-year wing to an extension ahead of restricted free agency may also be a factor. Whatever the cause, Marietta’s favorite son is currently logging 20.1 points via 15 attempts per game on .511 shooting from the floor, easily a career-high.

He’s even raised his 3-point shooting — an early-season source of consternation for Brown — to a healthy 38.9 %, while getting to the line 4.1 times per game and converting 78.4% of them (both career-highs).

Improved guard skills (dribbling and passing) coupled with the athletic ability to change speeds and draw contact, as well as improvements to his court awareness and body control have combined to elevate the former Golden Bear to an early fringe All-Star candidate, according to Yahoo Sports’ Chris Forsberg.

Inconsistent play, poor finishing, and a significant drop in two-point shooting percentages (which, despite improved accuracy and attempts from deep, fail to make up for an equivalent increase of shots closer to the cup) have conversely plagued Tatum’s anticipated breakout season unexpectedly.

To his credit, the Duke product has indeed boosted his reviled deep-two shooting percentages while also diminishing their frequency, instead boosting his attempts from beyond the arc and — in what ought to be a higher-percentage shot — close to the basket.

For Tatum, though, cold nights from the floor (such as a 1-of-18 shooting night he had against the Dallas Mavericks earlier in November) and the worst finishing numbers of his career for shots within three feet of the basket (44.4 % compared to a two-season average of 65.2%) have combined to suggest he’s actually regressing offensively.

At least so far this season.

There’s still plenty of time for both Celtics wings to make changes in their respective situations and, for that matter, for Boston to see its early-season win percentage shrink as they begin the tougher end of a West Coast road trip.

Consequently look to these unanticipated outcomes as a reminder that narratives are just that — incomplete analyses awaiting confirmation or refutation by results.

While the sort of players Boston hopes they have in hand for the long haul tend to exhibit big steps forward in their first three to four seasons, Tatum has time and Brown is showing exactly what the Celtics want to see from someone who recently inked a $115 million-dollar extension (including bonuses).

As to how it comes together and how far it will take the team, only the passage of time can tell.

Jaylen Brown honors fallen best friend Trevor Steede with his 22-point outing vs. Dubs

Boston Celtics wing Jaylen Brown played against the Golden State Warriors with a heavy heart, devoting the performance to his best friend Trevor Steede.

For Boston Celtics swingman Jaylen Brown, Friday night’s game was no ordinary evening.

It wasn’t because it was against a franchise that’s beat up on opponents for the better part of five years (and the Celtics have fared comparatively well against that team — the Golden State Warriors — anyways).

Nor was it because the team is riding an NBA-best 10-game winning streak atop the league’s best record, either. For Brown, it was personal.

Two years ago, Jaylen faced the same team on the road, just hours removed from the death of his best friend, Trevor Steede.

Steed, who befriended Brown when he transferred into the former’s school to play basketball (possibly stealing Steede’s spot on their school’s roster), tragically took his own life ahead of that Dubs matchup two years past.

“It was hard getting my thoughts together, but after talking to his mom and his family, they inspired me to come out and play,” explained the Georgia native after that game.

“I wasn’t in any shape to come out. I didn’t want to leave my room. But they inspired me to come out and play. And I came out and played in his spirit today. My teammates held me up and we pulled it out.”

After two rotations around the sun, Steed’s memory remains with Brown and carried him through one of the uglier tilt’s of Boston’s young season.

“I had all the confidence in the world today,” Brown offered (via NBC Sports Boston’s A. Sherrod Blakeley) after last night’s victory. “Today is the sunset of my best friend.”

Brown, at times, seemed bullet-proof to the chaos churning around him, pointing to the sky, presumably in Trevor’s memory, when he scored 22 points. Incidentally, Steede’s age when he passed and, odder still, the jersey number he wore for the team Brown likely forced his cut from.

“It was great for me to be able to score 22 points tonight,” Brown added, hinting at the connection.

Brown also left a commemorative message on his sneakers for Steede, reading “R.I.P. TLS”.

For Brown, being able to pull out a win on the anniversary of one of his most difficult games of his career must have been heartening, and a great way to honor his friend.

Teammate Marcus Smart, no stranger to loss himself, recognizes the importance of holding those we have lost close to our heart in the present.

“If you don’t talk about them out loud, that’s when they really die,” he told the Boston Globe’s Adam Himmelsbach last year, soon after his mother Camelia’s passing. “So I just try to talk about her as much as I can, talk to her when I’m alone, and just never forget that she’s always here in spirit and always here in my heart.”

Perhaps Steede was there with the fourth-year guard as well, smiling when Brown pointed to the heavens as he helped will the Celtics to a win.

But it was his memory that truly mattered last night, at least for Jaylen.

Clutch play from Celtics leads to comeback victory over Warriors

The Boston Celtics now have ten straight wins after edging out the Golden State Warriors in a hard-fought game.

The Boston Celtics nearly lost a game that, on paper, they should have won.

With the Golden State Warriors missing Klay Thompson and Stephen Curry for the majority of the season, they’ve been led by All-Star guard D’Angelo Russell. The Warriors jumped the Celtics early, closing the first quarter with a nine-point lead over Boston. By the end of the half, Boston would take a one-point lead with Tatum leading the team with 17 points at halftime but the third-year forward’s fortunes would all big change from there.

However, Russell would exit the game in the third quarter with a sprained right thumb after tallying 12 points and seven assists (along with nine turnovers), leaving guard Alec Burks and forward Eric Paschall to do the heavy lifting late.

Burks would score a team-high 20 points with Paschall not far behind with 16 points. Fortunately for the Warriors, they played strong team defense and were effective stopping nearly every Celtics player, holding what’s now a 10-1 team to 40.7% shooting from the field.

That didn’t matter in the final quarter, with Celtics star point guard Kemba Walker scoring 12 points (on 5-8 shooting from the field) in the fourth quarter (he finished with 20 points) and a suddenly inefficient Tatum scoring two key baskets in the final minutes to extend Boston’s tight lead.

The Celtics, who also got five threes from defensive stalwart Marcus Smart on the night, would win 105-100.

Had Celtics wing Jaylen Brown, scoring eight points on 4-8 shooting from the field in the first half before scoring 14 points on 5-9 shooting from the field in the second half, not been a stable presence for Boston the game might have been different though.

Brown, notching his career-best fourth straight game with at least 20 points, continues to play well on both ends of the floor and it’s not a stretch to say he’s playing the best basketball of any Celtics player right now.

Boston’s next game will be against the Sacramento Kings on Sunday.

Balanced attack vs. Wizards leads to Celtics’ ninth straight win

The Boston Celtics are now 9-1 after defeating the Washington Wizards on Wednesday.

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The Boston Celtics shared the ball, took advantage of turnovers, were efficient and looked like the team to beat in the East on their way to their 10th consecutive victory, defeating the Washington Wizards 140-133 and overcoming a 44-point effort from star guard Bradley Beal.

Jayson Tatum took over in the first quarter, Carsen Edwards played well in the second quarter, Jaylen Brown dominated in the second half and Kemba Walker made his impact felt offensively throughout the game as the quarter combined to score 88 points, with each of Tatum, Brown and Walker breaking the 20-point  mark.

Staying true to the players they’ve been this season, Tatum focused on scoring outside the lane while Brown attacked the rim and Walker let loose from outside. In fact, Walker knocked down 6-12 threes on Wednesday after entering the game shooting a career-high 43.7% from three, his efficiency from outside only matched by Edwards (4-5 from three) and Marcus Smart (4-8 from three) on the Celtics’ side.

Edwards’ career-high 18 points was nice to see, as he went scoreless last game and entered the contest averaging just 4.0 points per game. For a player who torched opponents to the tune of 24.3 points per game at Purdue in his third and final season before averaging 15.3 points per game in the preseason, his performance through the season has been underwhelming.

However, Edwards played light a bolt of lightning against Washington, racing down the court and making play after play.

The Celtics were unable to bottle up Beal, rookie forward Rui Hachimura (21 points on 9-12 shooting) or even Isaiah Thomas (18 points on 7-14), the latter of which who hit a three before the half to cut Boston’s lead down to two.

A game that plenty of runs, the game wasn’t out of reach for the Wizards until the final seconds, with Walker hitting a clutch three to put the Celtics up 140-133.