Boston Celtics: Player grades from game six bubble classic

For Boston Celtics fans, game six was a roller coaster ride of emotions, where the sentiment at the end was utter heartbreak.

This double-overtime loss for the Boston Celtics featured six players who played over 50 minutes, a Norm Powell isolation game-winning three-point attempt, a frenzied down the stretch sequence of plays, and even a coach posing as the opposition to force a Cs turnover.

Yes, some missed it initially, but Mark Jackson correctly pointed out this iffy, perhaps finable sideline position by yours truly, Nick Nurse. Nurse was trending on Twitter immediately after the game as Jaylen Brown even shared his post-game thoughts on the matter, stating how “grown men should be able to control themselves.”

Boston Celtics fans across the world should side with Brown on this point as Nurse completely violated the rules and spirit of the game to distract Jayson Tatum on his drive to the basket. By the letter of the law ( The NBA rule book), Boston should have been awarded a technical foul for this blatant act.

But I digress…. let’s talk about the rest of the game.

It’s a make or miss league, not a profound statement but a statement that analysts proclaim ad nauseam. When the Celtics shoot above X percentage, they win. When the Raptors shoot above X percentage, they win, and that’s been the story of this series.

Last night’s game was up in the air as both teams had stunningly similar shooting performances. In fact, in a rare occurrence, the Raptors and Celtics both finished with the same number of makes from the field (44) as Toronto took only one more shot on the night, which was an attempted three-pointer.

Early on, the Cs were in full exploitation mode of Toronto’s zone, a coverage that gives a large number of corner three-pointers. Boston’s first 12 points came from the corner, and on the night 22 percent of their shots came from this region, as this ranked in the 99th percentile for corner threes attempted, per Cleaningtheglass.com.

After their hot start, Boston cooled off drastically as they clawed their way into overtime. In a game where the entire starting lineup set their career highs in minutes played, the shamrocks will need to muster up enough energy to defeat the reigning champs.

As our heart rates start to settle down, let’s go through game grades for this bubble classic”

Kemba Walker: D

It stings to give Kemba Walker this grade.

Still, on a night where the Raptors zeroed in on his playmaking impact, with their box-and-one coverage, Walker failed to find his rhythm offensively and finished the night with only five points in 51 minutes of play, tying his career lowest playoff shooting night.

To give Walker some credit, he hit a tough late-game fadeaway, a Cardiac-esque shot against OG Anunoby down the stretch, and dished out seven assists, but this was simply not his night. The point guard also finished with three turnovers and four fouls.

On the defensive side of the floor, the Raptors seemed to target Walker on almost every play.

The Raptors even drew up a possible final play for Norm Powell to isolate Walker as they seemed okay with this play despite Powell’s miss. To their credit, the Raptors hit a bunch of tough shots over him, but the Cs defensively also needed to do a better job of helping their guard in the post.

While game six was a complete wash for Walker, look for a bounce-back as he’s known for delivering in the clutch.

Jayson Tatum: B+

Giving Jayson Tatum a B+ on the night feels wrong because he was one assist short of a 29 point triple-double and finished the night with two steals and two blocks.

While Tatum has exponentially improved his playmaking ability, his six turnovers on the night killed the Boston Celtics, as the Raptors were aggressively blitzing him. Despite his improvements in the playmaking department, Tatum struggled with his handle against Kyle Lowry and Fred VanVleet as the pesky guards were keen on pressuring him at every opportunity possible.

Accounting for 55 percent of all Boston’s free throw attempts, it still feels as if Tatum gets rookie treatment and perhaps doesn’t get half the calls he deserves.

Defensively, during game four’s loss, Tatum struggled to guard Lowry, especially coming off screens. In game five, the Boston Celtics made the needed adjustment to feature Tatum in a more off-ball, help heavy roll, one where he matched up primarily against OG Annonby.

One of the best help defenders in the league, especially at the top of the key — aka “the nail” — Tatum seemed much more at home with his defensive task. While primarily in a more off-ball role during game six, the Raptors guards converted on a series of drives when isolated onto Tatum.

Despite a loss during the 2018 Conference Finals, we’ve seen some epic Jayson Tatum game seven moments.

Let’s hope we get more of these come Friday.

Jaylen Brown: B+

It’s equally as difficult to give a B+ grade to Jaylen Brown given his team high scoring performance and career-high 16 rebounds on the night, but Brown had a quietly poor shooting performance as it took a total of 30 shots to get his 31 points.

As the Celtics’ first-quarter spark plug, Brown looked very aggressive early on, finishing the first half with 21 points. His corner three-point shooting was on point but struggled shooting from above the break.

His foul trouble has bothered him throughout this series as he picked up his fourth personal foul during the 9:07 mark of the third quarter.

While Pascal Siakam hit some difficult shots in Brown’s presence, he played great on-ball defense as he finished the night with two steals. The wing’s attacks off the dribble were a winning strategy for Boston as one could hope for a similar performance during game seven.

Marcus Smart: A-

While giving A’s or even A- grades during a loss doesn’t feel right, Marcus Smart was 100 percent deserving of such a high mark. He made a series of winning plays down the stretch as after a late-game strip on Pascal Siakam, Smart brought the ball up quickly and made a laser-like pass to Daniel Theis in what came to be the final points before the first overtime.

Smart almost even forced a final possession foul on Marc Gasol in what should have been a call before the inbound pass.

The All-Defensive talent’s hustle on the less glamorous side of the floor, paired with a triple-double on 54.5 percent shooting from three-point range (11 attempts), one could not have asked for a better, more efficient outing from the Celtics co-captain.

Similar to game one of this series, all but one of Smart’s six three-point makes on the night came from the corners. Look for him to capitalize on his hot shooting night as he’s known, at least during this series, for pairing two good shooting games together.

Daniel Theis: B+

Daniel Theis felt as if he brought back the spirit of 2013 Tyson Chandler, converting on countless clutch lobs down the stretch. Exactly all of his 18 points on the night came at the rim, and exactly all but one bucket came during the second half or overtime as he finished a team-high eight overtime points.

Some may call his points easy, but Theis’s big buckets down the stretch came as a result of continuously being in the right place at the right time.

While the center finished with five fouls on the night, let’s give him credit for not turning the ball over once during 47 minutes of play.

This is also just a complete observation, but Theis, similar to Tatum, also fails to get as many calls as he should. Throughout this series, the big has continuously been hit in the head on several plays, as the officials fail to review them for hostile acts.

The Boston Celtics were able to count on Daniel Theis down the stretch. He’s been a rock for consistency on both sides of the floor.

Brad Wanamaker: B-

After coming off his best playoff performance as a Celtic, Brad Wanamaker failed to get going offensively despite connecting on two of his four three-pointers.

He committed three fouls and a turnover in 18 minutes as Wanamaker was the only shamrock to play more than 10 minutes off the bench. From a strategic standpoint, the Boston Celtics opted not to substitute in Wanamaker during pivotal defensive possessions but rather roll with their traditional starting five.

With Gordon Hayward out of quarantine, it will be interesting to monitor Wanamaker’s minutes as the Cs may go with a shortened seven/eight-man rotation during game seven.

Grant Williams, Semi Ojeleye and Robert Williams III and: B

Brad Stevens was very conservative with their bench allocation of playing time as the C’s trio each played under nine minutes for the night.

Despite the limited time, each brought something to the table. Grant Williams looked great as he confidently knocked down two corner triples during the third quarter.

Semi Ojeleye had a fantastic “brick-wall” play against Pascal Siakam, resulting in a turnover.

To finish it all off, Robert Williams gave the Boston Celtics some nice hustle plays crashing the glass and stayed home on a Fred VanVleet isolation play.

Again, Boston’s bench unit may have played in limited, fill-in type minutes, but overall they provided some sort of oomph to help the team during game six. Like Wanamaker’s minutes, it will be interesting to see how  Stevens and the Celtics’ coaching staff manages the trio’s minutes heading into game seven.