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Celtics pull out hard-fought Game 2 win over Mavericks as Jrue Holiday shines: 10 takeaways
The Celtics weathered a miserable shooting night from 3-point range and still managed to squeak out a 2-0 series lead, defeating the Mavericks 105-98 in Game 2 of the NBA Finals.Ā
The Celtics weathered a miserable shooting night from 3-point range and still managed to squeak out a 2-0 series lead, defeating the Mavericks 105-98 on Sunday in Game 2 of the NBA Finals.
Here are the takeaways.
1. The Celtics are on the cusp.
They know they haven’t clinched anything yet. Joe Mazzulla walked into the locker room and immediately begged his players to stay hungrier. Jaylen Brown said the Celtics will “need to do it a little more” as the series shifts to the road.
2-0 is simultaneously tantalizingly close to a championship and also laughably far away. They could win the title in Dallas and celebrate on the Mavericks’ home floor if the 3-pointers star falling. They could split and have a chance to win at home. They could lose two straight road games — uncharacteristic, but certainly possible — and return back to TD Garden tied 2-2 staring at a very different series.
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But Sunday’s win offered a lot of highly encouraging insights.
The Mavericks can’t stop the Celtics from getting into the paint. Not when Luka Doncic lets his defensive assignment scoot around him seemingly at ease, and not when the likes of Dereck Lively, Daniel Gafford, P.J. Washington and even Derrick Jones Jr. all struggle to keep the Celtics’ slashers out of the paint.
The Mavericks couldn’t even beat the Celtics in their shooting variance game. On Sunday, the Celtics made just 10 of their 39 3-point attempts, but 31 of their 39 attempts were open spot-up looks generated by their trademark ball movement (and two of the eight that were last-second heaves that splashed in). Despite all the misses, the Celtics, a team that often loses when it can’t find the range, claimed victory in a Finals game.
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“Their record says that they have been the best team all year,” P.J. Washington said. “They have two superstars, they have a lot of great role players and they play team ball. So we’ve just got to be better.”
The Celtics might just be a better team, with better matchups up and down the lineup. That’s not guaranteed, but the first two games certainly seem to suggest it.
2. With Jayson Tatum still struggling from the field (6-for-22, more in a minute) and the rest of the team clanking 3-pointers throughout the first three quarters, Jrue Holiday put together his biggest performance in a Celtics uniform to date: 26 points, 11-for-14 shooting, 11 rebounds, three assists, and a number of crucial defensive plays.
Holiday scored repeatedly around the rim, getting to the basket and offering an outlet for Tatum when the defense collected around him. Late in the game, he forced Luka Doncic into a difficult spot in the back court, which led to a crucial turnover. Facing a scrambled Mavericks defense, Holiday then buried an open 3-pointer, which pushed their lead back to 11 and helped them hold off Dallas’ late charge.
A reporter asked Jayson Tatum where the Celtics would be without Holiday.
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“Good thing we don’t have to find out,” Tatum said. “We’re very, very fortunate to have him and he was excellent tonight.”
Holiday is the only Celtics player with a ring, and he finished Game 2 with a huge two-way performance that left him two wins away from a second one.
“We’re all determined as a team,” he said. “We all want this and it’s something that, it’s collective. I won’t say that I do much or I talk much. I feel like I’m more of an action type of guy. I go out there and I play as hard as I can and do whatever the team needs for us to win.”
3. Tatum’s shooting was ugly once again, but a couple of things are worth noting.
First, he took almost entirely good shots with the exception of one bad turnaround midway through the fourth quarter. Immediately afterward, the Mavericks scored, Joe Mazzulla called timeout, and Tatum attacked the rim and earned two free throws on the next possession.
Second, and more importantly, Tatum finished with 12 assists. The Mavericks were determined to cut off his water, and they did to a large extent, but Tatum still broke them down at the point of attack often and jump-started the Celtics’ offense as a passer.
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Tatum has consistently given great answers about his role on the team when opponents blitz and double-team him, and Sunday was no exception.
“There are going to be times where I need to score, and obviously, I need to shoot better. Golly,” he said. “But you know, really, we always talk about, ‘Do whatever it takes for however long it takes.’ If I need to have 16 potential assists every single night and that’s what puts us in the best position to win and it doesn’t mean I’m the leading scorer, by all means. If that gives us the best chance to win, sign me up.”
4. The Celtics missed a ton of 3-pointers, but they made four huge ones that helped decide the game.
The first was a half-court bomb by Payton Pritchard at the end of the third quarter. The Mavericks had been surging and cut the lead to six before the end of the period, but Pritchard banked in a half-court shot at the buzzer that pushed it back to nine.
“Man, that was incredible,” Brown said. “I heard he, like, checked himself in the game too. Like, he’s been hitting those shots all season long. If anybody has been paying attention to it, he’s made I don’t know how many of those, at least three or four. So tonight he made it in in biggest of moments.”
The second came from Derrick White at the very end of the shot clock midway through the fourth. As time wound down, White hoisted a 30-footer that caught nothing but net and pushed the lead back to 10.
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And the final two came on back-to-back possessions with four minutes left, one each by Holiday and White. Those threes helped them boost the lead to 14, which held up in the final minutes.
The Celtics’ defense put them in a position to win, and they made just barely enough 3-pointers to pull away.
5. If the Mavericks can’t figure out how to keep the Celtics in front of them a whole lot better very quickly, they might be cooked. They couldn’t survive the Celtics driving past them on a night when Boston shot just 25 percent from 3-point range. What happens when the Celtics start making shots again?
6. Block or foul?
Up top, the Celtics appeared to block the ball cleanly. Replays may have shown Jaylen Brown bumping P.J. Washington slightly in the back.
“My interpretation? It looked like a foul,” Jason Kidd said. “But it wasn’t called. So it wasn’t a foul.”
Either way, it was an incredible play. A reporter asked White about the mentality that allows him to go for those types of blocks.
“That’s why I got dunked on earlier,” White said, referring to a nasty poster by Lively. “But it’s part of the game. I think just that not being afraid to get dunked on allows me to get some that maybe some other people wouldn’t have gotten. “
7. Midway through the third quarter, Luka Doncic made a big shot and started barking at Celtics owner Wyc Grousbeck.
Grousbeck, apparently, had called for a technical on the Mavericks star, a motion Doncic didn’t much appreciate. Doncic said he didn’t know who Wyc Grousbeck was.
Doncic, who was questionable before the game with a variety of maladies, dominated the first half but slowed down in the second and finished with 32 points, 11 rebounds, and 11 assists, although he also posted eight turnovers. He was the reason the Mavericks had a chance, but his defense gives the Celtics a place to pick on every single possession (and the Celtics took it often).
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8. A concern for the Celtics going forward: Kristaps Porzingis came up limping after P.J. Washington collided with him going for a rebound midway through the fourth quarter. Porzingis fell awkwardly and didn’t appear to be running right afterward.
The Celtics insisted Porzingis is fine. For his part, Porzingis said he will be good and that he would “die out there,” which is a little much but still a good sign for the Celtics going forward.
9. Kyrie Irving continues to struggle against the Celtics: He was 7-for-18 with 16 points and missed all three of his 3-point attempts.
“It wasn’t all on me, but I’m definitely taking the majority of it because my teammates look to me to convert a lot of these shots and ease the burden of not just Luka but everyone else and settle our team,” Irving said. “We definitely made our dinner on the defensive end, but now offensively I have to play better.”
10. Game 3 tips off at 8:30 p.m. on Wednesday. The Celtics have a chance to take control of the series and come within a game of accomplishing their ultimate goal.
“It’s been great and the journey’s been awesome,” Holiday said. “But at the end of the day, the job is not done.”
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