“I expect it to be a tough game,” Joe Mazzulla said pregame when looking ahead to his team’s matchup with the Miami Heat. “Two competitive teams. Two teams that have had a lot of success over the years.”
There is a reason the NBA scheduled this one during “Rivals Week.” Boston and Miami have met in three of the last four Eastern Conference Finals, with the last two of those series going the distance. These two teams have delivered some classics over the last few years, so Mazzulla’s assumption was utterly reasonable.
Only this time was different.
Boston led by as many as 34 and trailed for just 17 seconds in their 143-110 win over the Heat on Thursday night. One of the driving forces behind Boston’s cruise to victory was their newcomer, Kristaps Porzingis.
After Miami nailed a three-pointer, Jaylen Brown, in his typical fashion, wasted no time and quickly advanced the ball up the court. Charging towards the wing, Brown forced Bam Adebayo to switch off Porzingis and onto him.
The result? A mismatch.
The 7-foot-2 Porzingis was left one-on-one in the post against a 6-foot-5 Haywood Highsmith. Using his size, Porzingis backed down Highsmith, drilling a 6-foot hook shot over the smaller defender. That deuce put Boston ahead for good, just 3:24 into the game.
The bucket was just two of Porzingis’ 14 points in the opening quarter, as the Heat had no answer for Boston’s new weapon.
In the past, Miami’s diverse defense, featuring a healthy mix of zone and switching, has given Boston fits – especially in last year’s Eastern Conference Finals. However, Porzingis and the Celtics had answers for everything Miami threw at them.
“It starts with trust. Just those guys building trust with each other,” Mazzulla said postgame when discussing the impact of Porzingis. “Just having the understanding that we have different ways that we can play… We’ve had a lot of moments of like, oh, this guy can make my life easier. On both ends of the floor, we have had that.”
Miami, who entered the night top ten in defense, couldn’t figure out how to slow down the new-look Celtics. Boston scored 42 points in the first quarter on a ridiculous 15-of-21 (71.4%) shooting from the field and 6-of-11 (54.5%) from deep. Boston’s 42 points were the most surrendered by the Heat in any quarter this season and marked just the fourth time Miami has allowed 40 or more points in a frame.
Porzingis led the way with his 14 points on 5-of-7 (71.4%) shooting, as he punished mismatches and Miami’s switching, and it was his presence that opened things up for Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown, who scored eight apiece in the frame.
“It’s huge,” Brown said on the options Porzingis gives the team when talking postgame. “Every night, you won’t be able to see it, but nights like tonight, you can see it a little better… Him just being out there as a threat. Teams have to respect it. His three-point shooting ability, and then he’s 7-foot-3 at the rim, so it just allows me, Jayson, and everybody else on our team to have freedom if we know we got somebody like that at the rim, so he’s big for us.”
The big man finished with a game-high 17 points on 6-of-9 (66.7%) shooting in the first half, registering a +17 and guiding the Celtics to a 13-point halftime lead. Boston finished with 77 points in the first half, two points shy of their franchise record and tying their season-high for a first half, with four of Boston’s five starters finishing in the half in double figures. It marked just the fourth time the Heat surrendered 70 points or more in a half this season.
“He just makes us really hard to guard,” Tatum said on Porzingis postgame. “Somebody his size. Obviously, [he] can shoot [and] take advantage of mismatches. You gotta make a decision. Are you going to switch? Then you put a small on him [and] we throw it to him. Are you going to be in drop? [Then] he drags a big out, and we throw it to him, and he shoots a three. Just having him out there presents so many challenges for other teams.”
That he does. So much so that Erik Spoelstra, one of the greatest basketball minds on the planet, couldn’t figure out a solution as Porzingis proved to be the answer to everything Miami threw at Boston.
However, after the dominant first half, Porzingis' night was cut short.
In the early moments of the third quarter, Porzingis contested a jump shot from Adebayo, rolling his ankle upon landing on Adebayo’s foot. After remaining down for several seconds and not attempting to run down the floor on defense, he hobbled around Boston’s bench until Mazzulla called a timeout following a three-pointer from Tatum.
Porzingis immediately limped to the Boston locker room after the timeout with the help of Boston’s training staff. Soon after, the team announced that he had suffered a sprained left ankle. He did not return to the game.
“He got me pretty good in the moment, but I’m feeling pretty good now,” Porzingis said postgame on the injury.
The big man added that if needed, he would’ve returned, “A sprained ankle is no big deal in general. So, if the situation needed, I would’ve been able to play, for sure. At that point of the game, it was smart to sit out.”
Porzingis is right. At that point, he had done his job. The Celtics had opened the third quarter on a 21-12 run, extending their lead to 22 points. And while you can never count Miami out, Thursday night was different.
Boston’s hot start set the tone for the night, and the hosts never recovered.
The Celtics finished the night with 145 points, the third-most points surrendered by Miami in franchise history. Boston reached that figure on 51-of-80 (63.8%) shooting from the field and 22-of-40 (55.0%) from distance. Boston’s 63.8% shooting is the highest they have shot in a game since April 3, 2011, and marks their second-highest mark on the road in franchise history.
Of their 51 makes, 36 were assisted, tying their season-high.
On the other hand, it was the third-highest field goal percentage ever allowed by the Heat.
Despite going into Miami and running the team that ended their hopes of returning to the Finals a season ago off the floor, the Celtics don’t view this as a statement win.
“I said to a few of the guys, this game is really good, but it means nothing at all in the grand scheme of things if we don’t take the lessons we need to apply it to the next game,” Mazzulla said postgame. “You enjoy it until we get to the plane, and then it’s onto the next one.”
Tatum offered a similar sentiment.
“All the games count as one, regardless of if we won by 28 or we won by two. They all count the same,” Tatum said. “It was a good win. But you know, it doesn’t mean anything essentially. We’re just trying to get better every day.”
While it may not be a statement in that sense, it most certainly serves as a statement from Brad Stevens and Celtics’ ownership. It was a loss to that very Miami Heat team last May that prompted the seismic changes Stevens and ownership made this offseason, and it was those new additions that gave Boston an edge they were missing last season.
The fact that we have come this far without a mention of Jrue Holiday, who totaled 17 points, five rebounds, five assists, and a blocked shot in just 28-plus minutes of action, says a lot about the surplus of talent on this team.
It was known Boston’s top-six, consisting of Tatum, Brown, Porzingis, White, Holiday, and Horford, was going to be lethal. Thursday night was just another confirmation of the masterpiece that is Brad Stevens’ vision for this team.
“We just learned from last year, right? Getting so close and not getting over that hump, and just give a lot of credit to the guys,” Tatum said on the team’s elite level of play. “We got Jrue Holiday and KP. They make a world of difference.”
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