If at first you don’t succeed, try, try, try, try, try again.
Before tonight, through a scheduling quirk courtesy of the In-Season Tournament, the Celtics and Knicks had already faced each four times in this regular season with Boston taking all four. Add in the preseason schedule and Summer League, it’s been seven head-to-heads since July. Outside of their Opening Night thriller, Boston has handled their Atlantic Division rivals for the most part, but that’s before seeing OG Anunoby as a Knick and NY losing Julius Randle for the year.
In Game #5 of their regular season series, the Knicks finally beat the Celtics 118-109 at TD Garden.
New York leads the league in offensive rebounding, grabbing 12.6 a night. On Thursday night, they used that hustle to their advantage; the Knicks had a whopping 17 offense boards and outscored the Celtics 22-12 in second chance points.
It was a bit of an anomaly game for the Celtics on the glass. Boston is a top-10 defensive rebounding team (72.6% defensive rebounding rate), but on a night with nothing to gain in the standings, boxing out was apparently optional for the overall #1 seed.
Three-point shooting isn’t exactly a measure of effort. The Celtics lead the league with 42.6 threes attempted per game and nobody would accuse the 62-18 Cs of low energy or lack of desire. However, there might have been some settling over their last two games with nothing to play for. On Tuesday night, they chucked up 52 triples in Milwaukee, making just 17. Against the Knicks, the starters combined for 5-for-24 through three quarters before waving the white flag.
Jayson Tatum finished with 18 points and seven assists. Jaylen Brown and Kristaps Porzingis chipped in with 15 and 14 respectively. MVP candidate Jalen Brunson had 39 points on 15-of-23 shooting for New York.
For those watching the standings, for the Celtics to meet the Knicks in the playoffs, it wouldn’t be until the second round or more likely, the Eastern Conference Finals. With the win, New York is nearly a lock to finish second or third in the East.
The Celtics play the backend of a back-to-back tomorrow night against the visiting Charlotte Hornets at 4:30 pm EST. With the top-9 all playing tonight, expect many of the starters to sit out with only the regular season finale on Sunday vs. the Wizards left before the playoffs next weekend.
