Boston Celtics: 3 keys to victory tonight to take back series lead
By Mark Nilon
The Boston Celtics find themselves tied at two games apiece against the Toronto Raptors in this best-of-seven Semifinals series. Should they wish to come away from tonight with a win, they’ll need to make some serious adjustments.
Despite looking like a team who could realistically sweep the defending world champions, the Toronto Raptors, early on, the Boston Celtics are now the losers of two straight and, in turn, look destined for the long and grueling series that many initially predicted this Eastern Conference Semifinals to be.
Saturday’s game-four was by far Boston’s worst performance of this year’s postseason, as they were seemingly inept on both offense and defense.
Being held to just 20 percent shooting from deep and committing 14 turnovers while allowing Toronto to shoot just under 40 percent from beyond the 3-point line, Saturday’s performance was, to say the least, irritating.
A team consisting of All-Stars Kemba Walker and Jayson Tatum, borderline All-Star Jayson Tatum, and the Swiss Army man Marcus Smart should not struggle as badly on either side of the floor as they did in game four but, alas, they did and, now, we look forward with this series tied at 2-2.
This is no dis to the Toronto Raptors, as they too have ample talent at their disposal and an unbelievable coach in Nick Nurse but, still, we certainly expected more from the Cs after such a painful loss like the one they endured in game three.
There are many adjustments Boston will need to make if they want to reclaim the overall lead tonight but, in the eyes of the Houdini, these are the three main keys to victory for them to come away from game-five victorious: