Freshly anointed as the top seed in the Eastern Conference, the Boston Celtics’ celebrations were dampened on Monday night against the Atlanta Hawks. Having led by as many as 30 points in the second quarter, the Celtics suffered a staggering collapse in the third quarter to give the lead away, and found themselves outplayed in crunch time to lose an absolute stunner of a game, 120-118.
Jayson Tatum led the shorthanded Celtics, playing as the nominal point guard and scoring 37 points. Jaylen Brown added 24 of his own, but struggled with efficiency, but struggled with his efficiency for much of the night. Rounding out the offensive focal points were Kristaps Porzingis and Payton Pritchard, who combined for 32. For the Hawks, a balanced scoring attack saw all five starters — Dejounte Murray, Vit Krejci, Bogdan Bogdanovic, DeAndre Hunter and Clint Capela — record double-digit scoring nights, with Bruno Fernando adding 13 off the bench.
The Celtics have been no strangers to playing shorthanded this season, but tonight’s game offered a particularly unique challenge. Absent Jrue Holiday (dead arm) and reigning Eastern Conference Player of the Week Derrick White (hand sprain), coach Joe Mazzulla opted to play a starting lineup with no nominal guards. Al Horford and Sam Hauser drew the start instead, with Tatum and Brown operating as offensive initiators, countering a Hawks starting lineup that all stood at least 6-foot-5. The unorthodox lineup produced results from the start — Tatum (14), Brown (13) and Porzingis (10) posted double-digit scoring in the first quarter, and the Celtics opened up a 44-22 lead heading into the second.
The onslaught continued into the second frame. Tatum cracked the 20-point threshold before the midway point of the quarter, and the team bought itself a 30-point lead in the process. The Hawks did not shoot particularly poorly — they just found themselves buried under an avalanche of scoring from the Celtics offense. However, future troubles were foreshadowed in the closing minutes, as the Hawks managed a run late in the half to bring themselves somewhere close to striking distance. The lead at halftime was 74-56.
The start of the second half marked a stark reversal in the teams’ fortunes. The Hawks outscored the Celtics 19-4 in the opening minutes of the quarter, bringing the State Farm Arena crowd to life as they stormed all the way back to within three points of a lead — an absolutely stunning turnaround.
Whatever Mazzulla said in the inevitable ensuing timeout seemed to work. The Celtics returned to the court and immediately laid down a patient, methodical 8-0 run to yank the Hawks’ momentum out from underneath them. Atlanta’s unlikely hero responded; Krejci recorded a personal 5-0 to once again draw the Hawks within single digits. This wasn’t the start of another massive Hawks run, as the Celtics fended them off through the end of the quarter, but the damage was done. The Celtics entered the fourth quarter hanging onto a 96-90 lead, with a tough battle between them and the finish line.
It didn’t take long for the Hawks to fully complete the comeback. Atlanta opened the final quarter with a 7-0 run in the first two minutes, quickly taking the lead over the Celtics for the first time in the entire game on a three-pointer from Wes Matthews. Svi Mykhailiuk responded with a three-pointer of his own, but the Hawks quickly put themselves back on top. A 15-5 start to the quarter for Atlanta — aided by a terrible eight-second penalty from Tatum — bought them an improbable four-point lead with eight minutes remaining in regulation.
The teams remained relatively knotted up across the next few minutes. Boston strung together a few timely buckets — including a surprise appearance from young guard Jaden Springer — and drew even with Atlanta at 107 apiece with just under six minutes remaining. After a Hawks timeout and a pair of missed free throws from Murray, the Celtics regained the lead behind a midrange jumper from Brown.
The defenses began to assert themselves as the clock ticked down, which favored the Celtics and their opportunistic unit. They began to shut the water off on the Hawks’ offense, and inched ahead by four points after a goaltending call against Capela with just over three minutes remaining. However, Hawks coach Quin Snyder challenged the call, and upon review, the block was ruled clean, taking the two Celtic points back off the board.
As the game entered crunch time, the teams traded free throws on either side of a Tatum midrange jumper to keep the score stable. Capela missed a potential game-tying dunk as the clock ticked under two minutes remaining, but after an empty trip from the Celtics, Bogdanovic found paydirt on a pull-up three to push Atlanta ahead by one. It was a shot that broke the game open for the Hawks — they embarked on a 7-2 run over the next minute of play to put themselves ahead 120-116 with nine seconds remaining, putting the game on ice.
Next up, the Celtics are staying right where they are — they return to the floor at State Farm Arena in Atlanta for a rematch with the Hawks this Thursday at 7:30 PM EST on NBC Sports Boston.
