Final: Jazz 107, Celtics 95

Injuries forced the Utah Jazz to go small on Friday night and that ended up as a blessing in disguise for the visitors. The Jazz scored 61 points in the second half without their starting frontcourt, which helped them pull away from the Celtics with an impressive 107-95 victory.

Gordon Hayward watched from behind the Celtics bench as his former teammates put together their best 3-point shooting night of the season, going 50 percent from the field (12-of-24) as they relied on smallball without Rudy Gobert (knee) and Derrick Favors (eye) available after the second quarter.

Ricky Rubio was on fire with a season-high 22 points for the point, leading a balanced Jazz offensive effort with five players in double figures. The hosts got a game-high 33 points from Kyrie Irving and 21 points from Al Horford but no other player crossed the double-digit point mark as the offense labored (40.7 percent shooting) for much of the final three quarters. 

Second Half Thoughts

• The Jazz were relegated to playing smallball with Favors and Gobert sidelined and it played their advantage perfectly. Jonas Jerebko and Ekpe Udoh split time at center as the only active bigs, while the visitors feasted on a shorthanded C's defense with a ton of wings/guards in the other four spots.


• Ricky Rubio helped push the lead to double digits early in the third quarter by making 10 of his first 11 shots from the field.


• The injury to Daniel Theis really hurt as Brad Stevens had nowhere to turn on his bench to guard undersized bigs. Semi Ojeleye filled in admirable but his lack of an offensive game and overall height disadvantage was challenging while facing off against Jerebko and Udoh.


• The Celtics did their best to stay in the game with big nights from Irving and Horford, but no one else on the roster showed up with any consistency.


• Jayson Tatum had one of the worst offensive games of his career (1-of-6), while the C's fired up countless bricks from 3-point range (9-of-30). Meanwhile, the Jazz shot the lights out and made all the big 3s (60 percent in the fourth) to maintain their double-digit edge for the majority of the final 24 minutes.

• Injuries were the real story of this half (outside of an atrocious second quarter from the C's shooting). Rudy Gobert (knee), Daniel Theis (face), Derrick Favors (face) all are out for the game with injuries. Gobert's looked the most serious as Favors rolled up into his knee as he jumped for a ball.


• The Celtics were red-hot to start, largely behind the strong offense of Al Horford (4-of-4) in first quarter. They shot 52 percent in the first quarter and took advantage of mismatches all over the floor against a turnover prone Jazz squad.


• The tide turned quickly in the second quarter though, behind Boston's worst offensive stretch of the year. They missed 10 straight shots to start the frame, and mustered just 13 points on 4-of-19 shooting over the second 12 minutes.


• Jayson Tatum and Marcus Smart have been absolute offensive duds early, combining for 0 points on 0-of-10 shooting. Kyrie Irving has struggled around the basket as well (3-of-9) against a surprisingly gritty Jazz defense with Gobert.

• Marcus Morris will miss his fourth straight game with a knee injury and won't travel with the team for its upcoming two-game road trip to Memphis and Indiana. "It’s not tendinitis," Morris said. "I don’t even know. Once I got it better it was feeling really good, and then a few games ago I got a little contusion and that aggravated it a little bit."


• The Jazz will have Joe Johnson back in the lineup for the first time in weeks after he missed 21 games with a right wrist injury.


• Jazz head coach Quin Synder raved about his former player Gordon Hayward before the game: “Gordon was a heck of a player, a great player for us. And I think everybody understands the decision that he made. So to see him get hurt, it was hard. We felt horrible for him. And I think most of the guys on our team reached out. I know I did. And I think he was appreciative of that. And at this point, you know, we wish him well in his rehab. Hopefully he’s back soon. At the same time, you know, our group’s moved on too. So that’s separate from Gordon’s injury. I think with respect to his injury, everybody feels for him and wants him to be healthy. And at the same time, we’re in a position with our team now where we’re getting into the chunk of the season, the middle of the season, and we’re focused on that too.”


• Jonas Jerebko will play his first game as a visitor at the TD Garden in three years after signing with the Jazz this offseason. He's averaging 6.4 ppg and 3.7 rpg through he first two months of the season.