BOSTON — After two straight losses, the Boston Celtics were staring down a mountain on Sunday afternoon, and his name was Nikola Jokic. The Rocky Mountain behemoth has been Boston’s kryptonite for the past few seasons, and with Kristaps Porzingis and Jrue Holiday sidelined, the task of slowing him down grew even more significant.
A three-time MVP, the Denver Nuggets superstar records triple-doubles in his sleep. He’s a near-unstoppable force in the post as a scorer, and throwing multiple bodies at him only strengthens his powers. Everything about his game is molded to punish opposing defenses for any choice they make. So, the Celtics made the ultimate choice:
Don’t worry about Jokic.
The best way to stop Nikola Jokic is to not care about Nikola Jokic
“We didn't talk anything about Jokic in the game plan,” Joe Mazzulla said firmly after Boston’s win over Jokic’s Nuggets. “It's not about him. It's about controlling all the other stuff that you can control.”
Jokic finished the night with 20 points, 14 rebounds, and nine assists—one dime away from the triple-double mark he’s become almost synonymous with at this point. Yet the Celtics still earned a 110-103 victory.
And as Mazzulla detailed, they manipulated Denver’s offense around Jokic into taking the shots Boston was comfortable with them taking.
“They're one of the best teams in the league on cuts,” Mazzulla said. “Can you take away all their cuts? Can you take away their transition leak-outs by not turning it over? By crashing the offensive glass? Can you try to keep him off the free-throw line? Can you win the minutes that he's not on the court? You don't really talk about him in a game plan. You talk about all the other stuff that you can control.”
The phrase “all the other stuff you can control,” which Mazzulla so purposefully emphasized in his explanation, is being carried by a single word: Can.
“Can” implies that Jokic cannot be controlled. His impact on the game is almost inevitable when the game plan is to slow him down. That’s what makes him such a unique talent.
By eliminating the way Jokic controls the game, the Celtics, by proxy, were able to keep him at bay enough to win.
The Celtics challenged Russell Westbrook and Christian Braun to shoot. They helped off those two, sending bodies to Jokic in the post when needed, and neither made the Celtics pay.
Even when Braun and Westbrook took their shots to the mid-range—and they got some buckets—it seemed mathematically acceptable by Boston’s standards. But the layers to that plan dive into Mazzulla’s points of emphasis.
By helping off of Braun and Westbook, the Celtics have more guys around the rim to stunt the cuts that Denver loves to employ. By adding size to the starting lineup (Luke Kornet) and playing double-big lineups for most of the night (Neemias Queta), the Celtics hounded the offensive glass and hindered Denver’s transition attack.
There are a million layers of detail to every decision the Celtics employ.
"No decision ever has one reason,” Mazzulla said when asked about the decision to start Kornet. “The decision has a plethora of consequences, good and bad.”
Not caring about Jokic was the best way for the Celtics to slow Jokic down.