Celtics vs Warriors Preview : A Potential Trap Game

The Boston Celtics have already exceeded  any expectations for the West road trip by defeating both the Trail Blazers and the Nuggets. Unfortunately for the Celtics, they will be facing a whole new monster when the face off against the league’s best Golden State Warriors.

To say the Warriors are a hot team would not even come close to doing them justice. The Warriors take no games off and after Klay Thompson shattered worlds in his last game the Celtics’ confidence may take finally take a hit against the West.

With Marcus Smart out due to injury the Celtics will have their work cut out for them against the leagues best back court. It may even wind up being a blessing in disguise that Smart is missing this game. Smart’s defense is one of the better aspects of his game. However, the Warriors have made it abundantly clear that no defense can stop the splash brothers when they find their groove. As a young player the Celtics are going to need Smart to develop into the kind of defender that can compete with the best scorers in the league. That being said, he would be too far over matched in the contest and it could have an impact on his confidence in the future.

While looking at any kind of matchup will make any Celtics fan cringe, they can hold out hope that this could wind up being a trap game for the Warriors. Whether they do it with their size or their shooting the Celtics are out of their league in this contest. Jared Sullinger may be able to produce of the offensive side. However, he will have to do so more with his shooting than play in the paint as the combo of Andrew Bogut and David Lee will prove to be too tough for him to have an advantage in the paint. The Warriors are on a four game winning streak, winning each of those games by double digits and scoring at least 122 points in all of them. Going against a Celtics team that is giving up the fifth most points in the league will leave the Warriors  expecting to put on another offensive clinic.

It is the potential overconfidence of the Warriors that can give the Celtics hope to stay competitive for two reasons. The Celtics have given up under 100 points in back to back games now and with them playing better on the defensive side the Warriors will have to run their offense at a high level to keep up their ridiculous scoring rate. If the Warriors come into the game expecting to have all kinds of easy baskets, they can wind up playing sloppy offense opening the window for the Celtics to take advantage.

The Warriors can also fall into the trap of thinking that they can simply outscore the Celtics without playing defense. The Celtics have proven that they can move the ball around and with contributions from many different players they can score at a high rate. The Celtics will need to have their most efficient game this season because the Warriors are playing defense about as well as they are playing offense. If the Warriors do fall into a shooting slump or begin to get sloppy in the half court the Celtics will still need one of their best offensive performances to put up a fight against the Warriors.

While this does have the potential to be a trap game for the Warriors, the biggest problem is that the Warriors do not take games off. They are capable of winning the game in so many different ways and even a below average performance will be more than enough to take down the Celtics at their best.

In their past two games the Celtics have proven that they can compete with teams in the West and they need to continue to do that against the Warriors tonight. While expecting a third straight win is far beyond unrealistic they should be able to keep the game within reach.

Of the Warriors’ six loses one of them did come against a team that is far below their level. The game against the Los Angeles Lakers is probably the only game you can consider a true off game for the Warriors and as bad as the Celtics have been this season they have shown a lot more promise than the Lakers. There may not be much hope but for a young team playing their best basketball of the season, being competitive against the best team in the league will go a long way in developing the squad’s chemistry and confidence.