Through the first 24 minutes of tonight’s game, the Boston Celtics endured quite the battle from the Minnesota Timberwolves and managed to head into the break with a 55-52 lead over the hosts.
In more important news, after a few games off, we are BACK.
Get ready for some halftime hot takes, buddy.
Joe Mazzulla has found the most hilarious way to utilize Jrue Holiday
So, this is now the second time that Joe Mazzulla has assigned Jrue Holiday to an opposing big man this season. He did it in the opener against the New York Knicks and had Holiday pick up Julius Randle.
Celtics dispatched Jrue Holiday as primary defender on Julius Randle in last night’s opener.
Randle when Holiday was the primary defender, per NBA tracking data:
2 PTS
1-10 FG
2 BLKKnicks were 4-23 FG with Holiday as defender. (10-48 FG vs Holiday and Porzingis) pic.twitter.com/nhSN2Jx6Lg
— Chris Forsberg (@ChrisForsberg_) October 26, 2023
Tonight, the All-Defensive level guard had the assignment of defending Karl-Anthony Towns and made the former No. 1 overall pick look extremely uncomfortable. Towns made his way to Minnesota’s bench about halfway through the first quarter, after he turned the ball over for the third time.
It’s almost like Mazzulla plots against any overrated big guy who lines up against the Cs and sends Holiday out there to expose them. It works like a charm as the larger players tend to look to take advantage of a “mismatch” against the smaller Celtics guard, failing as they try and do too much.
Jaylen Brown can still do super-cool dunks
Yeah, so Jaylen Brown absolutely murdered Rudy Gobert.
He also had himself a pretty solid start to this one. He poured in nine quick points in the first quarter, knocking down four of his six attempts in the period.
Brown followed that up with a five-point second quarter to bring his first-half total to 14.
Not to mention that he nearly put Gobert on the wrong end of another highlight play when he dropped him with a snatch-back, but failed to drill the jumper.
The Celtics are human
This first half has probably been the most mortal that this hoss of a Celtics team has looked so far this season. Of course, there was the game against the Miami Heat, where they were reeling for a bit. But, their low shooting percentages and eight turnovers have me feeling less than great tonight. Minnesota’s top-ranked defense has held the Cs to just 39.6/26.3 splits for the first half.
There hasn’t been too much to be excited about besides the play of Brown and Jayson Tatum, who have combined to score 27 of Boston’s 55 points so far.
Anthony Edwards is for real
The Timberwolves have scored 52 points so far and Anthony Edwards has 19 of them. He’s been a man on a mission all night and has kept Minnesota close in this one.
It felt like every shot that he took found the bottom of the net, regardless of how difficult it was. Boston really wasn’t able to find much of an answer for Edwards, no matter who was tasked with the job of slowing him down.
What’d you think so far? Let us know your hot takes below in the comments.
