After a 3-1 west coast swing the Celtics returned to face an inform Houston Rockets team who had beaten Boston’s competition for the number one seed – the Cleveland Cavaliers – twice in the last week. The road trip had drained the Celtics’ roster to the bear bones with Derrick White, Al Horford, and Sam Hauser all forced out of the game with minor injuries. Luke Kornet got the start in place of White in a double big line-up with Kristaps Porzingis and things went swimmingly for Boston, as they held a 12-point lead with around eight minutes to play. However, there was to be yet another fourth quarter collapse from the Celtics as they failed to execute, especially defensively down the stretch, and Houston pounced. Amen Thompson hit a floater over Jaylen Brown with 1.3 seconds on the clock to win it for the Rockets. Meaning yet another failure in the clutch for Boston.
After an early nine-point lead thanks to two deep shots from Kristaps Porzingis, the Celtics defenders deployed Joe Mazzulla’s strategy to roam off of Houston’s weaker shooters, mainly Dillon Brooks. However, as us Celtics fans have grown to expect he nailed all four of his shots from behind the arc in the first quarter. At this point you have to question Mazzulla’s strategy with helping off of shooters, the last three times he has deployed this defensive strategy it has been his team’s downfall. Brooks’ efforts took his team to a four-point lead after one.
The second quarter was mainly even as Boston’s defence halted the Rockets two best players. Alperen Sengun and Jalen Green only managed 23 points between them, but a young star made none of the matter. Amen Thompson had a spectacular outing, scoring 33 points on 68% shooting, his offensive production was the reason for Houston’s success in this game as he picked up the slack of the usual duo.
Boston finally made a run in the third quarter and dragged themselves back in front. No Celtic particular played well offensively, their superstar Jayson Tatum had a strange outing. He shot 5/14 from the field and only 1/7 from three but was a team high +11 and had seven assists and six rebounds. Tatum’s chances of winning MVP have dwindled over the past few weeks his offensive production has dropped in the month of January and his team continues to remain a distance behind the Cavaliers for the one seed.
The opening few minutes of the fourth quarter have decided the fate of many of the Celtics last few games, so when they opened up a 12-point lead with just eight minutes to play everything looked to be heading down the right path. However, the Rockets once again responded to Boston’s rally with a run of their own tying up the game in the last minute. But two defensive errors would be decisive in this game. The first of which Luke Kornet was caught sleeping by Sengun as the Turkish big man escaped the defence to get an open dunk. Luckily Tatum responded with a tough layup to tie the game, but yet again the defence failed to get a stop. This time Mazzulla asked Kornet and Jaylen Brown to switch yet the switch came too late, and Brown was unable to properly contest Thompson’s game winning floater.
The Celtics stay in Boston to face the Chicago Bulls at the TD Garden on Wednesday night looking to get back to winning ways.
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