The Boston Celtics and Philadelphia 76ers have their first matchup of the season tonight. While everyone is understandably hyping up Jayson Tatum vs. Jaylen Brown, another interesting wrinkle is the clash of two vastly different approaches to winning basketball.
The Sixers and Celtics have the two best records in the Eastern Conference, but how they have started so well is because they are operating with very different strategies.
For the Celtics, they have fully embraced Mazzulla Ball, which means revolving everything around Tatum's presence, but also winning on the margins. That means shooting a lot of threes, but it also means forcing turnovers and getting offensive rebounds. The funny thing is, it hasn't been as smooth as everyone had anticipated, but they are getting better and still winning anyway.
They don't have a bunch of exceptional individual players running the show. They are simply counting on the likes of Paul George, Derrick White, Payton Pritchard, and Mitchell Robinson, among others, to thrive in the system they built.
That's a very different contrast with the Sixers, who have largely depended on the assembly of star talent on their team. Brown, Joel Embiid, LeBron James, and Tyrese Maxey may very well be the NBA's most talented quartet. They haven't necessarily dominated, but they have consistently won when the going has gotten tough.
Boston has benefited from having the NBA's easiest schedule to start the season, but, in all fairness, it's not like Philadelphia's schedule was exactly a buzzsaw.
Neither process is perfect
The 76ers brought in Brown and James because, well, who wouldn't do that? Two excellent players to put next to Maxey and Embiid? From a talent perspective, that is good enough to win a championship. However, we have seen teams assemble extraordinary star talent and not live up to their potential. Not because they weren't good enough, but because the rest of the team couldn't hold up their end.
Phoenix trading for Kevin Durant and Bradley Beal to put next to Devin Booker never worked (nor did it come close) because the rest of the roster didn't give them enough of a foundation for them to thrive. Milwaukee trading Jrue Holiday for Damian Lillard failed because Holiday's absence ripped open so many holes in the roster.
The 76ers aren't in the exact same situation, but they don't necessarily have the connective tissue pieces a contender needs. The question will be whether the upfront talent they have is enough to compensate.
The Celtics have a philosophy that works. However, while we've seen it translate into regular season dominance, we technically don't know if the success will repeat in the playoffs. They didn't exactly show that several months ago. The 76ers showed them that this philosophy can be beaten, although, obviously, the circumstances have changed.
As much as Celtics fans hate to admit it, this team may play the way Mazzulla wants them to, but their lack of upfront talent could be a problem in the postseason. We'll know better when Boston takes this problem on.
That's why tonight is going to be so interesting. There's a good chance we're going to see the positives and negatives from each team tonight, and whoever's negatives stand out the least may very well be the victor.
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