C’s deliver on defense
Shut down Bulls in bounce-back victory
The crowd, out of sheer boredom, broke into the wave in the fourth quarter, and carried along Isaiah Thomas, Jae Crowder and Al Horford in its wake.
Such was the soothing, mind-freeing nature of the Celtics’ 100-80 win over Chicago yesterday. Two nights earlier in Denver, all three players would have been left shivering in the cold had they dared to jump in.
But first a note about the opposition yesterday. The Bulls scored nine points in the first quarter — tied for the lowest of the season by a Celtics opponent — in a 26-point first half that was indeed the lowest of the year by a Celtics opponent.
It almost felt too good, not even 48 hours after the Celtics gave up 119 points to the Nuggets during the road trip finale.
Avery Bradley certainly caught himself wondering what was real.
“I asked our team that when I came out of the game. I was like, ‘Are we playing defense that good?’” the Celtics guard said.
“And Al (Horford) looked over at me and was like, ‘Yeah man we’re defending the pick-and-roll very well. We’re talking out there,’” Bradley said. “He said it just feels completely different than the other night. They weren’t making shots, but I feel like our defense had a lot to do with that. We were pressuring the ball. The first play of the game we were all into our guys. I think that helped us out a lot. We set the tone.”
Until said tone disappears, anyway, which has been the pattern, most recently reflected into the contradictory success of a 2-3 western road trip that included the best win of the year against Golden State on March 8, followed by Saturday’s forgettable night in Denver.
Isaiah Thomas, in a relatively stress-free 24-minute performance that found the Celtics guard sitting out the fourth quarter, finished with 22 points on 9-for-14 shooting, including 4-for-8 from 3-point range.
Bradley, no longer under a minutes restriction now that his right Achilles is fully healed, added 17 points and six rebounds. Overall the Celtics were at their best from downtown, shooting 16-for-37 from beyond the arc.
So, with 15 games left, what’s it going to be for this team?
“We’re running out of time,” Horford said of the Celtics finally developing some defensive consistency.
“We have to do it, and it’s game by game,” he said. “In Golden State we took a step towards that, and we had a letdown in Denver. Now we played good again tonight, and we have to start building on it. We have to start committing to it.
“I think this was one of our best defensive games. All five guys were really locked in. I honestly think Amir Johnson was a big difference for us. It’s not going to show in the stats, but his presence and energy at the start of the game was huge.”
And from Chicago’s standpoint, that’s all it took.
The Bulls didn’t score for the first six minutes, spotting the Celtics an early 13-0 lead that probably should have been greater than it was. After a brutal first half performance in which the Celtics took a 20-point lead three times despite shooting in the vicinity of 40 percent, the Bulls spotted them again, this time for the first 10 points of the third quarter.
The Celtics glided out as far as 29 points before sloppiness took hold on both sides, with the lead falling to 76-57 by the end of the third.
The Celtics’ relaxed postgame nature stood in direct contrast to the soul searching in the visitors’ locker room, where Dwyane Wade was asked about Bulls management’s plan.
“I wish upper management could be answering these questions because I’m tired of answering the same ones every game,” the veteran guard said. “I don’t know. I wish I had the answers. But I don’t. I don’t want to say too much. I don’t want to say the wrong thing. I just want to get out there and try to play, and try to lead, and try to find a way that me and Jimmy (Butler) can be better to help these guys.”
At least the Celtics haven’t dropped to this kind of self-doubt, though depending on the night this season, they have certainly lurched in that direction.
Once again, though, they have an idea of what’s necessary to return to their former, top five defensive selves.
“We gotta play our best brand of basketball because we know Washington is playing really well right now, Cleveland’s not going to play like they have been for the most part,” Thomas said. “We just gotta control our own destiny, control what we can control, and that’s by bringing it each and every night. Luckily, we got home games so we need to protect home court and go from there.”