After a 10-day layoff, the NBA Finals have finally arrived, and the Boston Celtics wasted no time putting the Dallas Mavericks on notice. Racking up a commanding 29-point lead in the first half, the Celtics withstood a run from the Mavericks in the third quarter to coast to a commanding 18-point win and take a 1-0 lead in their return to the Finals, 107-89.
Jaylen Brown was the best player on the court for the Celtics tonight. He led the team in scoring with 22 points despite conservative shot volume (7-of-12 shooting), and he put in serious work defensively, snagging three steals and swatting three shots. Kristaps Porzingis made a triumphant return to the lineup, scoring 20 points in just 21 minutes in his first game action since the first round of the Eastern Conference Playoffs, while Jayson Tatum had a quiet scoring night (16 points) and struggled with turnovers (five), but otherwise recorded a customary 11 rebounds and five assists.
Predictably, Luka Doncic led the Mavericks in scoring with 30 points. The Celtics clamped down on his playmaking opportunities, however, holding him to an unprecedented two assists on the night. Kyrie Irving was completely absent, scoring just 12 points and shooting 6-of-18 from the field, and no other Maverick besides P.J. Washington (14 points) made much of a mark.
The game began evenly enough, with the Mavs thriving in the midrange while the Celtics opened the game relatively cold, missing a number of threes despite relatively loose coverage from Dallas. They remained within just a couple possessions of one another through a free-flowing first five minutes of play.
Then the unicorn entered the fray.
Porzingis made his return to the Boston lineup midway through the first quarter, and put himself on the scoreboard soon after. Going to work on the left elbow, he drew a foul in his first minutes of action — the first foul of a relatively referee-light first quarter — and converted on both freebies, before knocking down a midrange jumper from the same spot on the next possession. For a player who clearly wasn’t at full conditioning after injury, it was a ludicrous start — he was the game’s leading scorer in the opening quarter with 11 points, and tacked on two early blocks for good measure. The Celtics lead was 17 after the first quarter, 37-20.
Porzingis hit the bench to open the second quarter, but the Celtics churned forward. They targeted Doncic, setting up multiple opportunities for Brown to attack him one-on-one and force the 25-year-old to apply himself defensively. The strategy resulted in one of the game’s signature plays — a ferocious dunk after a blow-by against Doncic.
Porzingis checked back in after a brief rest, and Boston once again found another gear. With the 7-foot-3 center cooking and the entire lineup finding success from three-point range — every Celtic to take the court connected on a three except Payton Pritchard — the lead continued to swell. They crossed the 20-point threshold and even doubled the Mavericks up at one point, and walked into the halftime break with a 21-point edge, 63-42.
The Celtics came out cold as play resumed in the second half. Their offense stagnated, allowing the Mavericks to claw their way back into the game with a modest 12-5 run across the opening minutes of the quarter. Doncic found his rhythm, building to a game-high 27 points after three quarters, and the Boston lead slipped down to just eight points after he connected on a pull-up three pointer with just under five minutes remaining in the frame.
After a timeout from Joe Mazzulla, the Celtics righted the ship. Porzingis cracked 20 points on a thundering dunk and Brown pulled off an impactful stretch, drawing a pair of fouls on Dallas’ standout rookie Dereck Lively II (giving him five) before emphatically swatting shot attempts from Irving and Derrick Jones Jr. late in the quarter. Tatum, Horford and Brown connected on threes in the closing minutes of the third, and the Mavericks ultimately gained just one point on the Boston lead for the quarter, with the Celtics leading 86-66 entering the fourth.
Tasked with carrying their lead through to the finish line, the Celtics answered the bell. The Mavericks made no meaningful inroads towards a comeback in the fourth quarter, with the Celtics forging ahead by 25 points with just under five minutes to play. Mavericks coach Jason Kidd pulled his starters early, and the teams looked forward to Game 2 as the clock ticked down in regulation.
Next up, the Celtics will strive to get one win closer to the Larry O’Brien trophy, hosting the Mavericks for Game 2 at TD Garden this Sunday at 8 PM EST on ABC.
