The Celtics were going up against one of the best teams in the NBA without Jaylen Brown and Marcus Smart all the way across the country.
This one would have been easy to push the side on the way to hoping for better times in the week ahead.
Nope. No excuses. Just a pretty good win.
Brad Stevens' team beat the Clippers, 119-115, overcoming an 11-point deficit at halftime. The easy explanation was Tatum picking up the slack for Brown's absence, putting in 34 points. Or the re-emergence of Kemba Walker, who contributed with 24 points in 32 minutes.
But the true optimism came from three players who need to fill very specific roles going forward, a task they were each up to against the Paul George-less Clippers.
Carsen Edwards. Grant Williams. Semi Ojeleye.
They were the straws that stirred the drink in Los Angeles Friday night.
Starting with Edwards, he continues to be the kind of scoring punch that was advertised coming out of Purdue. This time the guard was put on the floor for 30 minutes by Stevens, coming away with 16 points.
It will be a day-by-day decision on how to use Edwards, with Payton Pritchard (19 minutes, 8 points) and Jeff Teague (17 minutes, 0 points). But at least he is in the conversation for a role the Celtics' desperately need filled.
“I think especially Carsen, last year was just hard to get minutes on that team. We were so deep at the wing and so interchangeable with that group that even when there were minutes available, you didn’t want to play small, you wanted to play more versatile,” Stevens said. “But he just kind of stayed with it, he’s had a really good couple of months and I thought his opportunity showed up a couple weeks ago in a game. And even when he’s playing he’s not getting down, he’s just staying ready. So you thought that he would play a role tonight but we don’t win without him. He changed the complexion of the game. That’s really encouraging.”
Williams has always been a jack-of-all-trades for the Celtics ever since his arrival last year. But lately the second-year forward's effectiveness has dwindled, seeing more than 15 minutes just once in the last six games. But this time, Williams stepped up when the C's needed him the most.
Getting the start in the place of Brown, Williams got 32 minutes, netting 11 points. Perhaps most impressive has been his continued ability to shoot from beyond the three-point stripe, going 7-for-10 in his last three games.
"I think in the last month there’s a clear difference from the first month of the season," Stevens said.
As for Ojeleye, his contribution was simple: He managed to limit one of the best scorers in the NBA, Kawhi Leonard, when it counted most.
"He doesn’t get a lot of attention for what he does," Stevens said of Ojeleye. "It’s not the easiest role in the world to be subbed in with 32 seconds left and guard Kawhi Leonard 1-on-1 and in a week’s time he’s on LeBron (James) at the end of the game and Kawhi at the end of the game. That’s how teams work, right? We don’t need everyone to put on a cape we just need everybody to do their jobs well.”