Takeaways from the Boston Celtics’ stunning 129-128 loss to the Los Angeles Lakers
The Boston Celtics had a successful trade deadline but couldn’t finish off the day with a win over their arch-rival Los Angeles Lakers.
A loss to the Lakers hurts.
A loss to the Lakers at the buzzer hurts even more.
A loss to the Lakers at the buzzer when RAJON RONDO, FORMER CELTIC, hits the game-winner is just the worst.
The Boston Celtics should never have lost to the Lakers at home, but here we are. It was a weird night, capping off a weird day in the NBA, so let’s break it down and see what we can take away from last night.
Kyrie’s forgettable shooting night
Kyrie Irving is a great shooter if you haven’t noticed yet. Last year, the All-Star point guard set a career-high for field goal percentage, shooting 49.1 percent with a True Shooting percentage of 61%. This year is a similar story, as he is posting a 49.8 FG% and a 60.1 TS%.
Irving went 6-for-21 from the field Thursday night and hit only one of his six three-point attempts, the first time he has shot that poorly all year. He still finished with 24 points thanks to 10 free throws, but he was not his highly-efficient self, causing the offense to stall a bit and opened the door for a Lakers comeback.
After the game, Irving said the Lakers length, particularly Brandon Ingram’s made it difficult for him to get good shots off. He noted the usual driving lanes he gets against other teams were closing down faster against the Lakers. Credit to the Lakers doing their best to stifle Irving. They are a top-10 defense this year, but it’s rare Irving has a poor shooting night like Thursday.
This is likely an anomaly, as Irving has played some the best basketball of his career lately. We’ll see what he does against the Clippers Saturday to make up for this one.
Third quarter woes
Thursday night highlighted another game where the Celtics failed to come out of halftime with a sense of urgency, especially on the offensive end. The offense stalled, they weren’t taking good shots, and when those jumpers weren’t falling, they let it affect their effort on defense.
The Lakers got hot from three, out-scored the Celtics 42-27 in the third quarter and turned what should have been a blowout into a close game. If you let a team back in, it’s hard to cool them off when you need stops down the stretch.
I’m not sure what the problem has been. Maybe they aren’t focusing enough during halftime adjustments. Maybe they think they can coast until the fourth quarter. I don’t know, you’d have to ask them. But it’s starting to become a trend for this team and you can’t afford to give up 40 points in a quarter come playoff time. That’ll sink you.
Lakers’ abnormal three-point shooting
Can we take a second to look at how crazy hot the Lakers were from three last night?
Like, man oh man were they hitting everything. They went 22-41 from deep (53.1 percent) with three different players hitting five threes each. The Celtics have never given up that many threes, ever.
To make things worse, the Lakers are 27th in the NBA this season in three-point percentage. So one of the worst three-point shooting teams in the league went off on the same night Irving had his worst shooting performance of the season. But hey, the Celtics still should have won.
But then came the mayhem.
Crazy endings
Considering everything that was going against the Celtics in this game, some their fault, some not. They were still up six points with a little over a minute to go. Then mayhem ensued.
Kentavious Caldwell Pope receives a pass from Rondo in the corner, hesitates, pulls up anyway with Irving right there, and drills it.
On the next possession, Irving got blitzed on a pick and roll and threw it away. LeBron James came back down the floor, drove left, lost the ball and threw a ridiculously high bounce pass to Caldwell-Pope. KCP threw it right back to James in the corner where he hit a contested three over Al Horford.
Jayson Tatum drew a foul on the other end and hit the free throws to put the Celtics up two. Then Kyle Kuzma hit a big three after a solid possession of ball movement by the Lakers.
The Celtics were in trouble, but Irving did what he does best by getting off a good shot in the clutch. He hit a nice floater off the glass to put the Celtics ahead by one when neither team had a timeout.
Brandon Ingram drove at Horford, Horford blocked it but couldn’t secure the rebound. After a few more times where the Celtics nearly secured the ball, Rondo found it and put up a last-second jumper. Of course, it went in.
Should the Celtics have made a trade at the deadline?. dark. Next
The Celtics gave up 22 threes to one of the worst shooting teams in basketball, Irving had his worst shooting night of the year and every bounce went against Boston in the closing minute. But still, the Celtics never should have lost this game, and they need to get rid of these snnoying little habits they’re picking up. The playoffs aren’t so kind to teams who play like the Celtics did last night.