Whether they’re hot or cold, the Celtics are determined to live by their 3-point principles
"Live by principle, not by feeling."
Despite a rough shooting night, the Celtics prevailed with a 108-104 overtime win against the Nets at TD Garden Friday night.
Cam Thomas fueled Brooklyn’s offense with several contested 3-pointers.
After the game, coach Joe Mazzulla shook his head when asked if it was difficult to stick to his gameplan under the circumstances.
“No. It’s not that tough,” Mazzulla said. “Live by principle, not by feeling.”
The Celtics shot 14-for-53 from 3-point range, but a few key ones late in the game that helped them prevail.
The Celtics lead the league in 3-point attempts (51.4 per game) and makes (18.5 per game). They know who they are, what they’re good at, and they stick with it, forward Jayson Tatum said.
“That’s like principles of life,” Tatum said. “You’ve got to be the same person when things are going great and when things aren’t. [Mazzulla] always talks about how things aren’t going to go how we expect … whether we’re missing guys or we’re not hitting some shots that we normally do, how are we going to respond?”
Sam Hauser had a tough night, missing eight of his first nine 3-pointers. But, Tatum never lost faith. He found Hauser in the corner for a triple that put the Celtics up by 1 with just over two minutes to go in regulation.
“If Sam’s open, if he’s not open we always want him to be a threat,” Tatum said. “Not necessarily shoot it every time, but we have so much confidence in Sam that we were mad when he missed it and he was mad at himself. “
“Al was yelling at him on the bench like ‘Yo, don’t ever put your head down’. We always believe the next one is going in because he’s such a proven shooter. He works hard at his craft.”
Mazzulla reminded Xavier Tillman and Jordan Walsh of the expectations not to pass up open shots.
“It’s hard at times, with guys that are in and out of the lineups and sub patterns are different,” Mazzulla said. “But, at the end of the day, they just have to feel empowered that when they’re open, they have to shoot it.”
“They work on it every day, I watch them do it,” he added. “I trust them. Obviously you want to pass and move the ball, but when you pass up the first good look as good as defenses are in the NBA it’s harder to generate those when it’s late in the clock.”
The Celtics won Friday’s contest without Jaylen Brown, Kristaps Porzingis, and Luke Kornet. Tatum said he enjoys the challenge of finding different ways to win on a nightly basis, adding that the pressure that comes with the championship-level depth of the Celtics is a privilege.
“You want everybody to be healthy, you want to play with the full roster as much as you can,” Tatum said. “Long season, that’s just not how it’s always going to be. You find moments throughout the season where it’s challenging and certain guys are out. Regardless, Joe says it’s a privilege. We have starters out or guys out and we’re still like always expected to win.
“We have that mentality, next man up,” he added. “We call it a stay ready group for a reason. Moments like this, you can look to throughout the season as it gives other guys more opportunity that we might need them in the playoffs or whatever. So yeah, we can use moments like this as things that we need down the road that will make us a better and stronger team.”
Mazzulla trusts the players to let it fly when they have good looks. The players trust Mazzulla to put them in the best positions to succeed, Horford said.
“I think every coach is different, but the one thing I can tell you is that I learned to trust Joe pretty quickly,” Horford said. “He has a good feel for the game, and I just trust his judgement. I feel the same way. We prepare, we do the things we need to do, we’re ready to go and we’re sticking to what we do. We just have to do things consistently and I think that’s the key for us.”
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