Inconsistent Celtics aim to get even vs. Warriors
The Boston Celtics hope a recent trend continues as they open off a four-game trip in San Francisco against the Golden State Warriors in one of the highlighted games on the NBA’s holiday card Monday afternoon.
The Celtics fly west after a 119-115 overtime setback at home to the Atlanta Hawks on Saturday night, their fourth defeat in an eight-game period of alternating fortunes.
The good news for Boston: It hasn’t lost two in a row since its previous holiday appearance — a 118-114 defeat to the visiting Philadelphia 76ers on Christmas Day.
The Celtics and Warriors have split each of their previous three regular-season matchups. In each occasion, Golden State won the first game (by an average of 8.7 points) before Boston claimed the rematch (by an average of 25.7 points).
The Warriors started this year’s head-to-head on a similar note, defeating the Celtics 118-112 in Boston on Nov. 6.
Stephen Curry topped Golden State with 27 points, but all eyes had been on Celtics forward Jayson Tatum, who was meeting Warriors coach Steve Kerr for the first time since earning a gold medal together with Team USA at last summer’s Paris Olympics.
Tatum was benched twice by Kerr during the tournament despite winning an NBA title only weeks prior.
Tatum recorded a game-high 32 points in the defeat. He leads Boston in scoring (27.7 points per game), rebounding (9.3) and assists (5.4).
The Celtics have struggled to resemble last season’s championship club over the last five weeks, finishing only 10-9 after a 19-4 start.
Boston coach Joe Mazzulla alluded to lessons acquired in previous losses as a possible positive to the club’s inconsistency.
“We’ve got to get better at our late-game execution,” he remarked. “We had a chance to win (against the Hawks), and we didn’t execute it.”
Golden State has experienced ups and downs of its own following a similarly quick start. The Warriors were 12-3 when they won in New Orleans on Nov. 22 but have gone only 9-17 since, never winning more than two in a row.
Golden State enters Monday’s showdown on a two-game winning run but ended their 122-114 home victory against the Washington Wizards on Saturday night without Curry and Draymond Green on the floor.
Curry walked to the sidelines on a painful left ankle with 1:05 remained in the game, while Green lasted just three minutes until he succumbed to a tight left calf. Green was scheduled for an MRI on Sunday.
Both will be game-time decisions.
Kerr stated following Saturday’s triumph that he’s optimistic Andrew Wiggins can help pick up the burden if the injury news once again turns bad for a club already without Jonathan Kuminga, Brandin Podziemski and Kyle Anderson.
Wiggins recorded a season-high 31 points against the Wizards and is averaging 25 points over his previous three games.
“The way things have evolved the last couple of weeks, we just really leaned into his scoring,” Kerr said. “He’s doing a lot of excellent things for us, scoring in numerous ways. The way he rebounded (11 against the Wizards)
… He was terrific.”
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