3 Boston Celtics players that must have a strong second-half of season

Though they may have found themselves getting off to a slow start to the season, since the calendar year flipped to 2022 the Boston Celtics have easily been one of, if not the hottest team in the entire league.

Rattling off 17 wins in their last 24 games which also included a monstrous nine-game win-streak, pulling out of the All-Star break Ime Udoka’s squad looks to continue their successful trend upward and, in turn, carry on with their push for a top-five finish within the Eastern Conference.

Now, of course, despite their recent surge there are still plenty of things that must go right for the shamrocks to surpass some of the other conference contenders that reside in front of them within the standings.

From making the most of their vacated roster spots to seeing continued excellence from their dynamic duo of Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown, there are plenty of things we at the Houdini could point to as being truly imperative to keeping this team’s momentum alive as we descend on the league’s second-half stretch.

Of course, there is also the concept of seeing individual players show out for their team during the final few months of the regular season, which could wind up leading to major positives overall and, of those on the Boston Celtics, we believe that there are 3 talents, in particular, who must have a strong post-All-Star game run:

Boston Celtics player No. 1) Aaron Nesmith

Aaron Nesmith is a player that we at HH, along with a bevy of other Boston Celtics fans have consistently been waiting to see find sustained success at the professional level since being taken 14th overall back in the 2020 NBA Draft.

To this point, despite showing flashes of what could be every now and again, he has yet to prove that he’s capable of being a regular contributor within a team’s rotation which has us begging the question: how long will it take until the C’s just give up on him altogether.

Earlier this month we saw a youngster in Romeo Langford, who put forth similar inconsistencies and was drafted in the same position the year prior to the Vanderbilt product, being shipped out to San Antonio in the deal that landed Derrick White in Boston and, quite frankly, he was actually starting to become a rather valuable two-way rotation figure within the team’s lineup–more so than Nesmith, at least.

Should the 22-year-old not be able to come even close to providing the attributes the shamrocks thought they were bringing on when they selected him within the draft lottery (steady shooting stroke with major upside overall in the scoring department), there’s quite a real possibility that he’ll wind up being given the Langford treatment as soon as this upcoming offseason.

With the fact that both the 2019 lottery selection and veteran wing, Josh Richardson, are no longer in tow, there’s every reason to believe that Nesmith will have an increased opportunity to show his worth during this final stretch of the season, but the clock is undoubtedly ticking.