Streaking Celtics strike right balance

The Boston Celtics were missing two key members of their rotation.

There was no shortage of players to fill the void.

Jaylen Brown scored 22 points to lead a balanced attack and the Eastleading Celtics stretched their winning streak to eight with a 126-101 victory over the Atlanta Hawks on Wednesday night.

The Celtics were missing injured guards Marcus Smart and Malcolm Brogdon. It hardly mattered.

Led by Brown, the Celtics put seven players in double figures. Jayson Tatum had 19, Grant Williams 18, Derrick White 16, Sam Hauser and Luke Kornet 15 apiece, and Payton Pritchard 14.

White also had 10 assists, Kornet went 7 of 7 from the field, and Hauser did all his scoring on a 5-of-6 performance from 3-point range.

“We’ve got a lot of guys who can do a lot of things to help us win games,” White said. “We trust every person on this roster. When they come in, they do good things for us. It’s a long season, there are gonna be injuries, people out. We’re gonna need everybody.”

The Hawks were coming off a big win at Milwaukee and eager to show they could challenge the best in the conference.

Not on this night.

Boston took control in the first quarter against the cold-shooting Hawks, whose occasional spurts were quickly snuffed out by the Celtics’ stifling defense.

Trae Young led the Hawks with 27 points, but was held to 10-of-23 shooting, including a mere 2 of 7 from beyond the arc.

Shooting has been a problem for the Hawks — quite a change from their high-scoring of a year ago.

“We are thinking about it too much,” Young said. “It’s just a matter of going out there and playing, playing free, getting back to playing with confidence.”