Logo
The Ticker
6 days ago

Painful Reminders (Part I): The Celtics Drafted JaJuan Johnson Instead of Jimmy Butler

On June 23rd, 2011, Brian Robb and I stood around a high top bar table in Tommy Doyle’s in Kendall Square.  Before us lay one of the biggest mounds of buffalo chicken wings I had ever endeavor to make disappear.  These 25 cent flappers- one of the few indulgences afforded to the participants of our [...]

18
6 days ago

Chris Wilcox: 2012-13 Final Grade

There are a number of contextually-appropriate ways to craft this post. One would be to forgo words entirely, and represent Chris Wilcox’s entire season with a series of videos. That would involve one part of this: For every eight parts of this: Note the headline on that second clip. Someone was so amused/enraged by Wilcox’s [...]

12
7 days ago

Rajon Rondo’s 2012-13 Final Grade

Here’s a sweeping general statement involving super specific statistics that may or may not mean anything: In the 1423 minutes Rajon Rondo played this season, the Boston Celtics were outscored by 1.3 points per 100 possessions. When he sat (including all contests after he tore his ACL), Boston was better than their opponents by 1.8 [...]

92
8 days ago

Avery Bradley Elected to NBA All-Defense Second Team

Avery Bradley has been a standout defender for the past couple seasons…in the regular season anyway. Now he has a trophy to prove it. The NBA announced this afternoon that the third-year guard has been elected by coaches around the league to the second-team all-NBA defensive team for the first time in his career. Bradley [...]

13
11 days ago

Paul Pierce’s Contract: Dispelling The Myths and Stating The Facts

The first domino to fall this offseason is Paul Pierce’s contract. Until Danny Ainge figures out what he’s doing there, little else matters. As we wait for this decision, we also must face the rest of the offseason, which means it is also rumor season. With that time of year, comes plenty of information floating [...]

42
11 days ago

Final Grade: Avery Bradley (C+)

In his third year in the league, in which promising players often make brash leaps from benchwarmer to starter, from starter to star, Avery Bradley took a big step back. But his regression might be deceptive. When he returned to the Celtics’ lineup on January the 2nd after two in-season months recovering from offseason shoulder [...]

9
Browse Archives by:

Game 7/82: Celtics (5-1) @ Thunder (3-2) Open Thread

Boston at Oklahoma City
7 P.M. ET
Ford Arena
CSN

Offensive Efficiency:
Boston: 105.7 points/100 possessions (17th)
Oklahoma City: 105.9 points/100 possessions (16th)

Defensive Efficiency:
Boston: 99.3 points allowed/100 possessions (3rd)
Oklahoma City: 110.7 points allowed/100 possessions (27th)

Probable Oklahoma starters:
Kevin Durant, Jeff Green, Russell Westbrook, Thabo Sefolosha, Nenad Krstic

Thumbnail: The Celtics face their second toughest challenge this season as they take on a very good Oklahoma City team.  The Thunder are a young team that can really fill it up when they need to.

WHAT THE THUNDER DO WELL:

  • Matchup.  The Thunder are a matchup nightmare for any NBA team that is traditionally put together.  Kevin Durant at 6’10″ starts at small forward and Russell Westbrook is on the taller side for point guards at 6’4″.  They are also as athletic as they are talented.  They can outrun and outjump any team out of the gym, especially an order team like the Cs.

WHAT THE THUNDER DO POORLY:

  • Shoot the Three Ball.  The Thunder added shooters Morris Peterson and Daequan Cook this offseason and neither has produced much of anything.  Peterson has to yet to play and Cook has gone 3-for-13.  Why Cook has a job in the NBA is beyond me.  No one on the Thunder roster is shooting over 29% from deep this season.


PLAYER(S) WHO MAKE ME WORRY:

  • Kevin Durant.  How could he not worry you?  He’s still scoring the ball as prolifically as ever but this year he has also made a concerted effort to rebound the basketball averaging 6.1 boards a game.
  • Russell Westbrook.  On Friday, Rajon Rondo battled Derrick Rose on his way to point guard supremacy.  Tonight he takes on Russell Westbrook, the guy who arguably beat out Rondo for the final Team USA roster spot.  Westbrook has upped his scoring from last season averaging 22 points and 6 assists.

PLAYER(S) WHO DO NOT MAKE ME WORRY:

  • Thabo Sefolosha. For as good as this guy is offensively, he is just a “missing person” on the offensive end.  Right now, he’s shooting .333 from the field this season and has the lowest TS% (39.5%) for any shooting guard who plays at least 20 minutes a game (HoopData).

WHAT WE WAN TO SEE FROM BOSTON TONIGHT:

  • Hold on to a lead:  Presuming the Celtics lead at some point in this game they need to show that they can hold on to it.  Giving up leads was commonplace last season for the Celtics and they have let their opponents force overtime twice this season.  The season may be young, but the Celtics cannot continue to keep piling on the minutes.  They have shown that they want to win these games but with a better/deeper bench the Celtics should be able to put teams away when they have a lead.

PREDICTION:
The Thunder are not as good on the defensive end as they were last year.  Despite addressing their needs at the two guard position in the offseason, they have been worse from outside.  I expect the Celtics to exploit these weaknesses in a tight one.  Celtics 100, Thunder 95

(All Numbers Taken from Basketball-reference.com)

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>