After falling down 22 points, the Boston Celtics stormed back against the Miami Heat to capture their fifth straight win.
Here's what stood out:
Nikola Vucevic has arrived
Nikola Vucevic made his Celtics debut on Friday, and man, did he pick the game to have as his first. We’ll get to that shortly.
As for the big man’s individual performance, he made it clear why the Celtics felt the need to go out and get him at the trade deadline. The easiest thing to notice with Vucevic is how crisp his passing is. I genuinely am not sure if I’ve ever seen someone throw passes as hard as this man does.
They’re like lasers out there.
As Brad Stevens put it, “he’s big and long and strong.”
Vucevic logged a double-double, of which he’s had many throughout his career, and the majority of his scoring came from simply being stronger than everyone else.
Boston’s new No. 4 made a habit of sealing his man, catching, and finishing in the paint, as the Celtics stormed back into this game in the third quarter.
He finished the night with 11 points, 12 rebounds, and four assists, including this huge dime to Derrick White.
Derrick White with two unbelievably clutch plays pic.twitter.com/qg9T7amd31
— Pull up shoot (@NElGHT_) February 7, 2026
A true tale of two halves
I don’t know if there was something wrong with the rim closest to the Celtics bench, or what, in this game, but both teams spent a half in complete control. For the first 24 minutes, Miami seemingly couldn’t miss, while the Celtics struggled to get anything going. They made just one of their 20 three-point attempts in the first half.
It was gross, disgusting, nasty, whichever word you’d like to describe it with, as long as it’s negative, it fits.
The script was completely flipped in the second half. Boston struggled a bit in the opening few minutes, but then spent the majority of the third quarter erasing a 22-point deficit as the building came alive.
No joke, this was probably the loudest TD Garden has gotten all season long.
The lineup of Derrick White, Baylor Scheierman, Payton Pritchard, Sam Hauser, and Vucevic put together a stretch of stops and scores like you wouldn’t believe.
Boston finished off their comeback with a strong fourth quarter, resulting in the second-straight best win of the season.
Sixth man Payton Pritchard is different
Earlier this week, Payton Pritchard returned to the bench in the wake of the Vucevic trade, which sent Anfernee Simons to the Chicago Bulls. Simons had been serving as Boston’s microwave all season, but without him, they lacked a primary ball handler in their bench unit.
In his first two games back on the bench, the reigning Sixth Man of the Year dominated with 26.5 points per game.
He picked up right where he left off when the team returned home Friday. His scoring fueled Boston’s second-half run. Pritchard poured in nine third-quarter points and added another 10 in the fourth to bring his total to 24 on the night.