After the Celtics shot a league-high 42.5 three-pointers per game last season, they’ve doubled down so far this year and have shot even more at 50.7. But if imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, the Bulls have mimicked the Mazzulla ball approach.
Chicago has the largest differential between last season and this season in 3FGA at 10.8. They’re right around Boston’s output from 2023-2024 at 42.9, but that’s a marked difference from being at the bottom of the league last year at 32.1.
If you’re one of the many that don’t like where the modern game is heading, it might be time to embrace the movement. It’s coming fast and wide. Other bottom dwellers have also caught three-point fever, including Charlotte (+10.5 3FGAs), and contenders like Orlando (+7.4), Phoenix (+7.7), and Minnesota (+8).
The other half of that Oscar Wilde quote about imitation though? “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery that mediocrity can pay to greatness.”
Maybe it was the juice off the NBA Cup and its point differential scoring system. Maybe it was the post-Thanksgiving tryptophan affecting the defense. But on Friday night, both teams put their three-point shooting to the test. Boston made a whopping 23-of-54, that included Payton Pritchard hitting five in the 4th quarter. Not to be outdone, Chicago put up 51 triples and made 20. Nikola Vucevic was a blistering 6-of-9. It’s the first time all year that both teams shot 50+ threes.
We even got this inconsequential-to-the-game-but-consequential-to-the-point-differential, Bird-like 3 from Sam Hauser:
Chicago’s roster is similar to Boston’s. Both have three-point shooting bigs. Both have several above average perimeter players that can drive-and-kick and catch-and-shoot threes. Both have at least eight players that shoot over three triples a game.
But even with similar outputs from behind the arc, the teams are obviously miles apart. A year ago during the In-Season Tournament, head coach Joe Mazzulla infamously ran up the score against the Bulls. This season, Chicago has a top-5 offense and has little issue putting up points, but the defending champs are 16-3 while Chicago currently sits outside of the Play-In Tournament at 8-13. To wit, in five games that the Celtics have made under a third of their threes, they’re still a pristine 5-0; the Bulls, however, have dropped all four of their bad shooting nights.
This is all to say that Boston has just found other ways to win, too. Despite a slight slippage from last year, the Celtics still boast an above-average defense and now have Kristaps Porzingis back in the fold to protect the paint. They can play different styles with multiple bigs at their disposal and All-NBA caliber wings that can score at all three levels.
To build on Wilde and what the Celtics are doing, consider this wisdom from George Bernard Shaw: “imitation is not just the sincerest form of flattery — it’s the sincerest form of learning.”
