BOSTON — Jaylen Brown only took two post-game questions after the Boston Celtics’ loss to the Utah Jazz on Monday night. The first was regarding a no-call late in the fourth quarter. Keyonte George slipped, and it appeared as though Brown tripped over him, though no foul was given. Utah ran down the other end and Lauri Markkanen tipped in an alley-oop from rookie Walter Clayton Jr. to put Utah up by one point.
“It's a minute left in the game or less, and you completely—The whole staff blows the f****** call,” Brown said. “I mean, it cost us the game. Unacceptable.”
The other question? Boston’s offense.
The Celtics can't make shots...
For the sixth time in eight games, the Celtics shot below 45% from the field. The only times they have eclipsed that mark have been the loss to the Philadelphia 76ers on Opening Night and their 32-point win over the New Orleans Pelicans.
Somehow, their three-point shooting has been even worse. They’ve shot up 35% just one time—their win over the Cleveland Cavaliers.
The Celtics have yet to shoot 50% from the field in a game, and they haven’t sniffed 40% from deep.
Offense has been a chronic problem.
“We just got to play basketball,” Brown said. “I thought we got a lot of good looks. We just shot the ball poorly tonight. I think we were like 8-for-45 or something, nine for—We shot a lot of threes, but I feel like a lot of them were good looks.”
Celtics made NBA history vs. Jazz (in the worst way possible)
On Monday night, the Celtics shot 11-of-51 (21.6%) from beyond the arc. Of all instances when a team has taken at least 50 threes in a game, it was the single-worst shooting performance in NBA history.
Nothing was clicking. It was an ugly night lowlighted by a third-quarter performance that was a lot worse than the 26 points they mustered up.
Boston shot just 9-of-23 in the frame, including a 1-of-11 showing from deep, and their lack of success putting the ball in the basket directly led to the Jazz’s offensive finding a rhythm. After a 36-point first half, Utah dropped 38 in the third quarter alone, shooting a red-hot 13-of-18 from the field and 4-of-7 from distance.
“I thought our offense put pressure on our defense to where we just had too many empty possessions offensively, and they were able to score,” said Joe Mazzulla. “Whether it was and-ones, or offensive rebounds, or a little bit of, like I said, some of our defensive miscues oncorner threes. So, I think just getting so many empty possessions offensively just put too much pressure on our D, and we didn't hold the fort down.”
But what happened?
Utah’s ball pressure? Poor screening from the center room? Timely turnovers? All of those issues certainly reared their ugly heads in the third. Yet shot-making was still the primary diagnosis.
It has been all year.
“Mostly it was misses on relatively decent shots,” Mazzulla said.
Up to this point in the season, the Celtics have generated the ninth-most wide-open threes (closest defender six-plus feet away) per game in the NBA at 21.6. They’re shooting 37.1% on those looks, which ranks 19th.
Boston also ranks second in the NBA in open three-point attempts per game (closest defender four to six feet away) with 19.7.
They are shooting 29.7% on those shots. That’s 25th in the NBA.
“I feel like we're getting like, decent looks,” said Payton Pritchard.
The solution? Make shots.
By the numbers, the Celtics are getting decent looks. They’re creating a ton of open and wide-open three-pointers every single night. But the shots just aren’t falling.
And on a night like Monday, that’s not good enough.
“If you're just not hitting shots in this league, it puts a lot of pressure on your defense,” Pritchard said. “I mean, you see it in the second half, they got to the free-throw and hit threes, so then, it stagnates. Makes us more stagnant on offense, just because we got to take it out on a set defense. So, if we're making shots, then we can set our defense better. It's just a better flow.”
The Celtics had plenty of problems on Monday against the Jazz.
Their big-man rotation struggled on both ends of the court, whether it was screening or fouling. The rebounding problems popped up yet again, as Utah corralled 15 offensive boards, including a game-winning rebound and put-back by Jusuf Nurkic in the closing seconds of the contest. Fouling was yet again a potential point of concern, as the Jazz shot 25 free throws (though they also had 18 turnovers).
Yet more than anything, the Celtics’ poor shooting shone through as the primary culprit, just as it has been for a bulk of the season.
Boston hasn’t been starved of opportunities. They just can’t convert.
“We have to be able to knock down shots,” Mazzulla said.