Do not invest more money than you can afford to lose.
Their pace is great.
“It was nice to see the ball go in the net, ” Boston coach Brad Stevens said. “We needed to make things a lot more hard than that to start the game. We were lucky to respond the way we did”.
With the game tied at 16, the Celtics reeled off a 22-4 run to take control of the game.
“I just thought he was aggressive right out of the gate”, Stevens said, “Even though in the first one or two possessions where he drove the ball and kicked it across the floor I thought it was a move with authority instead of a move with hesitancy”. “They did a great job defensively”.
Olynyk felt like the team was waiting for this kind of performance, in which Boston’s offense exploded with 40 points in the first quarter to jump out to a 20-point lead. In addition, he has scored in double digits in three of his first five games.
The Wizards finally showed a few life with a 16-2 spurt of their own behind the rejuvenated combination of Wall and Beal.
He did, hitting a corner 3-pointer to close the team’s afternoon session, then went out and scored a season-high 19 points on 7-of-11 shooting with seven rebounds, four assists, four steals, and a block in Boston’s inspired 118-98 triumph over the Washington Wizards. He’ll sit out of practice Sunday for further rest but is expected to participate in Tuesday’s game against the Bucks. It’s unclear whether or not he’ll be on any sort of minutes restriction, but he’ll return to the starting lineup, pushing Isaiah Thomas back into his normal bench role. Center Marcin Gortat (10 points) was the only other Wizard to reach double digits in scoring. You want as many of your bodies on hand as possible and obviously Marcus with his defensive ability and the way he’s impacted games is a guy that we’d hope to have.
“Our pace was unbelievable”.
The Celtics, who came in shooting 26 percent on 3-pointers, were 12 of 21 after the third-quarter outburst but missed their last nine shots from behind the arc, but it didn’t matter. He was helped to the locker room by Sullinger and Stevens didn’t have a report after the game, saying “I heard that he bumped his knee”. Wall was just 6 of 17 from the floor, 0 of 3 from 3-point range.
“When they’re constantly scoring and scoring and getting steals, it’s like, ‘OK, when is this going to stop?’ ” Beal said. “They did a good job of putting themselves into the passing lanes”. His absence created a matchup problem against the guard-rich Wizards.
However, it is the season’s narrative that should prove the most troubling to Wizards fans who have now lurched from overwhelming joy after the win against San Antonio to possible deep confusion in a blowout loss to the Celtics. Boston F Amir Johnson started despite tweaking an ankle on Wednesday night.
