Celtics get red-hot and run away from Heat late: 8 takeaways

Boston Celtics

The Celtics won the game with a franchise-record 10 3-pointers in the fourth quarter.

Derrick White and the Celtics got hot from three and demolished the Heat in the fourth quarter, claiming a 129-116 win.

Here are the takeaways.

Derrick White started an avalanche.

The Celtics won the game with a franchise-record 10 3-pointers in the fourth quarter, but Derrick White got things going in the first half by breaking the lid off the rim.

White made NBA history by burying five 3-pointers and blocking four shots in the first half. Few players are better equipped than the Celtics guard to make 3-pointers and block shots in that kind of volume, but Friday’s game was exceptional even by his lofty standards.

In the second half, White kept shooting and stayed red-hot, even banking in a ridiculous heat-check attempt at one point and turning to the bench with a wry look.

“I think I made a few in a row, and everybody was like, there was no chance you were driving on that one,” White said. “So I just tried to get some space and the bank was open.”

By the time the buzzer sounded on a double-digit win, White had a season-high 33 points on 11-for-20 shooting, and he went 9-for-14 from 3-point range, his highest total since March, when he made nine against the Trail Blazers.

Since the start of December, White’s shooting was already trending upwards—entering Friday’s game, he was shooting 49 percent from the field and 38 percent from three, totals which look a lot more like last year’s borderline All-Star performance than his shaky months of October and November. After Friday’s outburst, White’s 3-point percentage for the month jumped to 42.9.

Even in a new role with greater responsibilities as a shot creator, White was always too good for his early-season numbers, and an upward swing toward the mean was probably inevitable. If his shooting levels off at something close to last year’s numbers by the time the season is over, the Celtics will become a significantly more dangerous team even if the improvements they make before the trade deadline are marginal.

Sam Hauser shook himself out of his slump, too.

The arrival of Anfernee Simons might have relegated Sam Hauser to second place on the list of the Celtics’ players who can change the entire complexion of a game in a two-minute span, but Hauser is still a gasoline-soaked rag just waiting for a match, and after the Celtics wrested some control of the game away from the Heat at the end of the third quarter, Hauser ignited the fourth.

Less than a minute into the period, Hauser buried his second triple of the game, ripping the net with the kind of conviction that suggests he’s about to get hot. Just 15 seconds later, Hugo González—who we will get to in a minute—read Simone Fontecchio’s half-hearted attempt at an entry pass perfectly, tipped it away, and jump-started a fast break that led to another Hauser 3-pointer. He canned that one, too, and the Celtics’ lead went from one to seven in less than 30 seconds. Two minutes later, Hauser curled around a screen from Queta for his third triple of the quarter, which pushed the lead to 12. By the time he made his fourth near the four-minute mark, the damage was mostly cosmetic—the Celtics were well on their way to a comfortable victory.

Like White, Hauser—who finished with 15 points on 5-for-6 shooting, all 3-pointers—has had a rough start to the year. He twisted his ankle early in the Celtics’ loss to Detroit, and his 0-for-10 performance against the Bucks was the team’s least aesthetic shooting line on a horrific off night roster-wide.

But like White, Hauser is too good at what he does to stay this cold—entering Friday’s game, he was shooting 34 percent from deep, and just 35 percent on catch-and-shoot jumpers, according to Synergy Sports.

That won’t hold, and—again, like White—if Friday’s game was the start of a Hauser upswing, the Celtics could be in for a nice stretch.

“I feel like sometimes shot making is contagious,” Hauser said. “And once you see a couple guys make a couple, then you make a couple, then it’s like you just feed off each other’s energy. And sometimes you have quarters like that where it’s just an explosion.”

Hugo González showed the skill of playing hard.

In the past, the Celtics have used Maine as a way to develop and prepare talented-but-flawed prospects for the NBA game, and notable success stories include Hauser, Luke Kornet, Terry Rozier, and—perhaps most notably this season—Jordan Walsh.

González, however, is an interesting case because he doesn’t necessarily look like he needs time in the G-League. Having played for Real Madrid’s senior team for three seasons prior to the NBA, he isn’t perfect (because what 19-year-old is?), but he’s ready for NBA basketball in a way that some just-out-of-college prospects aren’t.

That is in no small part because he has one quality that Joe Mazzulla describes as a skill: The ability to play incredibly hard at all times.

“I just think some people are just better at it,” Mazzulla said. “I think he played 18, what was it, 17 straight minutes maybe? Something like that? Not everybody can do that and play at the level of consistency that he did for those 17 minutes.”

González finished with 10 points, but he also racked up two steals and a block that showcased his effort. On his block, González defended Heat star Norman Powell and cut him off as he drove into the paint, then he dug deep and hustled out to contest Dru Smith, sending Smith’s corner 3-point attempt packing.

His steals were no less impressive—the aforementioned steal that led to Hauser’s 3-pointer was preceded by a pick in the post when he fought around Adebayo to take away a pass that would have given the Heat center great position in the paint.

“I just try to play the game like that because that’s how I like to play it and I feel like it’s really useful for a team,” González said. “We’ve got a lot of guys, not me especially, but everybody, that we play with high energy. We played with a high energy today and that’s why we got the win.”

The Heat demolished the Celtics on the offensive glass.

The Heat crashed the glass hard and made the Celtics pay for their small-ball lineups with a 17-6 total, outscoring the Celtics 24-11 on second-chance points.

But the Celtics changed the game in the second half—they scored all 11 of their second-chance points in the second half and lost the margin just 14-11 in the final 24 minutes.

“They killed us on glass. So that’s obviously a big point of emphasis for us,” White said. “And then there’s obviously other ways of creating turnovers and stuff like that that can kind of get you back into the shot margin.

“I think when you’re getting beat like that, it helps if you make a lot of threes in the fourth quarter. But just trying to compete, use our speed. Obviously, we’re smaller than them out there, but five guys committed to rebounding and use our speed on the other side.”

Jaylen Brown surpassed Tommy Heinsohn.

Brown struggled in the first half and turned the ball over five times, but he quietly found his way to yet another efficient, box-score-stuffing 30-point outing with 9-for-18 shooting, a pair of 3-pointers on four attempts, nine rebounds, seven assists and—notably after his disastrous performance against the Pistons—a 10-for-11 evening at the free-throw line. 

With one of those free throws, Brown surpassed Tommy Heinsohn for 13th on the Celtics’ list of all-time scorers. Heinsohn is, of course, a singular giant in the franchise’s history, but he also marks the start of a gauntlet of giants Brown will likely surpass this season (assuming good health) that includes Bill Sharman, JoJo White and Dave Cowens.

A rookie mistake?

Heat rookie Kasparas Jakucionis made an audacious attempt at a layup with 9:11 remaining in the first quarter, bouncing the ball off Derrick White’s back with an inbounds pass and going up for a layup (which he smoked).

White proceeded to have his best half—and then his best game—of the season in a double-digit win. 

One can’t help but wonder if Jakucionis would like that one back.

Isaiah Thomas made an appearance.

Thomas was seated courtside next to Celtics owner Bill Chisholm and was greeted with an appropriately huge reception by fans at TD Garden. He spoke with NBC Sports Boston’s Abby Chin on the broadcast, praising his former teammate Jaylen Brown for the way the Celtics star is leading his team, and Thomas admitted that he couldn’t have seen Brown’s development arc coming. 

During his tenure with the Celtics, Thomas’ teams were defined by their grit and hustle—they were far from the best teams in the franchise’s history, but they made fans feel something, and TD Garden reacted to them in kind. 

“He’s done so much for the city and really for the organization, and I came right at the tail end of him being here, but just who he was as a person and a player, it just says a lot about him,” Mazulla said. “He sets an example of, yes, it’s about winning, but also when you’re a high-character guy, people appreciate you, and you’re able to leave the place a little better than you found it.”

What’s next

After playing just two games in 11 days, Friday’s contest marked the start of the three games in four nights for the Celtics, who will now travel to Toronto to take on the Raptors tomorrow. They will then return to TD Garden for the front end of a home-and-home against the Pacers on Monday.