Celtics hold off furious 76ers run, win third straight: Takeaways

Boston Celtics

The Celtics escaped with a win they deserved but very nearly frittered away.

Jaylen Brown and the Celtics nearly let another winnable game against the 76ers slip away, but they held on late and claimed their third straight victory with a 109-108 win, improving to .500 for the first time this season and 1-0 in the NBA Cup’s Group B play.

Here are the takeaways.

That was close.

The last few breathless seconds of Friday’s game had an uncomfortable sense of inevitability to them.

With the Celtics up by eight and 1:30 remaining, a 76ers team that seems to have embodied the Never Give Up spirit of Tyrese Maxey this season instead of the They Always Beat Us spirit of Joel Embiid began to chip away, and fate started to tip in their favor.

Of course Maxey buried a massive 3-pointer.

Of course Derrick White, who struggled enormously once again, missed a makeable floater on the next possession.

Naturally, V.J. Edgecombe – who otherwise had a much quieter game than his roaring debut in the season opener – canned a 3-pointer that cut the lead to two with 51 seconds left.

Jaylen Brown then drew a foul, and – of course – he missed one of his two free throws, leaving the door open for the Sixers, who – as one would expect – cut the lead to one on a driving finish by Maxey.

The wheels then came off in earnest for the Celtics, who couldn’t get the ball inbounds and over the half-court line in time, and Brown’s desperate attempt to do so resulted in an offensive foul, which felt like it would inevitably lead to the go-ahead bucket.

The chaos wasn’t finished – Maxey missed a tough layup, and Josh Minott got the rebound only to miss both free throws, opening the door for the Sixers once more with three seconds left.

Finally, however, the Celtics seemed to get their defensive legs under themselves. They kept the ball out of Maxey’s hands on the final possession, and the Sixers were forced to inbound to Quentin Grimes. Grimes took too long and passed to Embiid, who hoisted a 3-pointer after the buzzer sounded and missed badly as the Celtics escaped with a win they deserved but very nearly frittered away.

Jaylen Brown as the 1A superstar has been fantastic.

Before the game was dragged through the muck in the second half, Brown put together another masterclass. He controlled the pace of the game offensively in the first half seemingly effortlessly, getting whatever he wanted inside and outside the arc. The Sixers never had a good answer for Jayson Tatum, and they don’t really have anything for Brown either now that he’s playing Tatum’s role.

Brown finished with 32 points on 13-for-19 shooting and made four of his seven shots. His five turnovers were less than ideal, but his six assists were the product of a player who had his hands on a lot of what went right as the Celtics built their lead.

The Celtics are fun when they have a rhythm.

When the Celtics can get out in transition, they are an incredibly aesthetically pleasing team to watch.

Part of the reason is the effort – the Celtics at their best are a scrappy group that plays incredibly fast and is happy to have any player push the pace. They can get to the rim, they can spray the ball around the perimeter to generate threes, and – as they proved throughout much of the first quarter – they can knock down open mid-range jumpers. When Anfernee Simons gets going, the offense becomes really difficult to stop, especially in tandem with Brown’s early-season brilliance.

The problem, of course, is that it’s very difficult to maintain a free-flowing pace over the course of an entire game, especially against a team like the Sixers that can grift their way to the free-throw line. As the Sixers made a 32-8 run to tie the game late in the second quarter and deep into the third, they found themselves at the free-throw line over and over – by the end of the third quarter, the Sixers had a 26-8 advantage on free-throws attempted.

Essentially, the Celtics played 20 minutes of their best basketball of the season early and spent the rest of the game clinging to it. Ultimately, they were successful, and over the last few games, we’ve gotten a genuinely encouraging look at what the Celtics can be at their best. They won’t be perfect, but when they can get up and down the floor, they are dangerous.

Hugo González threw himself all over the floor.

Fortunately for González, 19-year-olds are notoriously quick at bouncing back from aches and pains. That’s important, because González played Friday’s game without an iota of regard for his personal health and safety.

Maybe González’s most painful-looking collision occurred between himself and the basket stanchion – in the closing seconds of the third quarter, Anfernee Simons tried to do a little too much (not for the last time), and the Sixers got a breakaway. Quentin Grimes flew up the floor and attempted a one-handed dunk, but González swooped in and committed a foul, slamming himself into the basket. Grimes hit both free throws, but the effort by González was notable. The rookie also dove for a loose ball, flew through the air to create a number of second-chance opportunities, and took a shot from a flailing Embiid to the midsection which the officials called a foul on him instead of a flop by Embiid.

González sat down with five points, five rebounds (three of which were offensive) and five fouls in his 15 minutes of action. The effort is unquestionable, even if the polish isn’t entirely there yet.

Anfernee Simons tried to be more aggressive (with mixed results).

Simons has had a nice start to the season in Boston, but he seemed to be pressing on Friday, especially in the second half.

Twice, Simons spent nearly the entire shot clock trying to attack Sixers defenders who ultimately forced him into the paint where Adem Bona swatted him at the rim. Late in the third quarter, Simons tried to do too much and got ripped, which led to the aforementioned Grimes breakaway and González’s attempt to impale himself on the stanchion.

Speaking to reporters afterward, Simons said Celtics coaches have begged him to be more aggressive. He certainly was on Friday, and when he’s on, the Celtics’ offense is really difficult to stop – Simons’ three-level scoring is a massive asset on a team with several other three-level scorers, and his microwave 3-point shooting alongside Sam Hauser’s microwave potential can lead to exponential runs (Simons was a team-high +23 in the box score and was crucial as the Celtics built their lead).

Still, finding the balance between pressing and being aggressive seems to be the next big priority for Simons.

Derrick White and Payton Pritchard are still struggling.

White hit a pair of spot-up 3-pointers in the second half, but he still finished 2-for-7 from deep and 6-for-16 overall – continuing his struggles as he tries to shoulder more responsibility. So far, he simply doesn’t look as comfortable shooting with more defensive pressure and more ball-handling responsibilities.

The solution still could simply be patience – give White a chance to rise to the occasion, like he has done so many times previously in Boston.

Pritchard, meanwhile, came up with his own solution for a 3-point slump: He started shooting closer to the basket. He made the Celtics’ first three shots and four of their first six all inside the arc, finishing 6-for-8 from two and just 1-for-9 from three.

It’s hard not to wonder what might happen if Pritchard and White break out at the same time.

Joel Embiid still looked pretty bad.

Embiid looked better than he did during the season opener when he seemed to be actively making the Sixers worse, but he is still far from the dominant force the Celtics have faced and so effectively limited in the past. He settles for jumpers far too often, seemingly in large part because he isn’t healthy enough to get into the paint, and while grifting foul shots has always been a big part of his game, he needed his 7-for-7 performance to get to 20 points even more than usual. On the defensive end, the Celtics weren’t afraid to attack him either on the perimeter or even when he was trying to protect the rim.

The Celtics equaled the Sixers in rebounding.

The Celtics and Sixers both finished with 56 rebounds in total, and the Celtics grabbed more offensive boards than Philly – 16-9 as González, Minott and Hauser snagged three apiece.

Mazzulla’s mitigation strategies seem to be having an impact, although a huge test is on the horizon.

Next Up

The Celtics will now head home to face a Rockets team on Saturday that, on paper, has enough size to grab just about every available rebound, but they are catching the Celtics at a time when they seem to be figuring themselves out.

Next week, the schedule eases a bit with games against the Jazz and Wizards on Monday and Wednesday respectively.