Celtics have worst shooting bench backcourt in the NBA over 19 games

The Celtics have a strong stable of versatile reserve guards in Marcus Smart, Terry Rozier and Shane Larkin. All three players have been integral parts of the team's wins on multiple occasions this year, including Smart seemingly on a nightly basis with his defense and playmaking. However, as Brad Stevens continues to express that his team can play better in the wake of a 16-game winning streak, there's one place he can look for a heap of his squad's offensive struggles: the bench backcourt.

Here's a look at the players overall shooting numbers on the season through 19 games:

Rozier: 33.7% FG, 32.6% 3-pt, 34.9% 2-pt FGs

Smart: 27% FG, 25.3% 3-pt, 28.4% 2-pt FGs

Larkin: 25% FG, 25% 3-pt, 25% 2-pt FGs

Smart's shooting struggles have been widely documented here at BostonSportsJournal.com, but Rozier's dropoff has been just as alarming in the past couple weeks. He's 5-of-26 from the field (19 percent) in his last five games, ending the trend of being one of the regular players on the bench unit that comes up with timely scoring contributions to help balance out the group's collective offensive woes.

Larkin has been dealing with similar struggles of late too. After a 17-point outburst filling in for Irving against Charlotte on Nov. 10, the point guard has missed 14 of his last 15 shots over his last five games, scoring just four points in 47 minutes.

Collectively, the problem has been just as dramatic inside the arc for the guards as it has been from the perimeter. Rozier, Smart and Larkin all rank in the bottom 14 of the NBA leaderboard in 2-point field goal percentage among rotation players (over 100 minutes). It's not just midrange shots either, as all three players are shooting under 43 percent on shots at the rim, more than 10 percentage points below the NBA average.

Collectively, the bench backcourt is combining to take more than 25 percent (22.4 attempts) of the team's shots on a nightly basis. That shot total has to go down or at least one person in this group needs to break out of a slump. Otherwise, the C's scoring lulls in the first half will continue to be an issue that weighs down Boston's offense on a nightly basis.