The Celtics don't want to give up on the one seed just yet. The undermanned hosts rode big nights from Jayson Tatum (24 points) and Marcus Morris (team-high 25 points) on their way to their sixth straight win in front a capacity crowd at the TD Garden. They have now won six straight games overall, all coming without All-Star guard Kyrie Irving. Boston outscored the Raptors 28-15 in the fourth quarter, making a big run as the team turned to 2-3 zone in the fourth quarter, which Toronto had trouble figuring out.
The victory puts the Celtics just two games behind the Raptors in the standings with six games left to play and one head-to-head meeting left between the two teams (Wednesday night in Toront0).
GAME: No. 76 of 82
WHO: Celtics (52-23) vs. Raptors (55-20)
WHEN: 7:30 p.m.
WHERE: TD Garden
RADIO: 98.5 The Sports Hub
TV: NBC Sports Boston, NBATV
Celtics
PG: Terry Rozier
SG: Jaylen Brown
SF: Jayson Tatum
PF: Al Horford
C: Aron Baynes
Raptors
PG: Kyle Lowry
SG: DeMar DeRozan
F: OG Anunoby
F: Serge Ibaka
C: Jonas Valancunias
First Half Notes
- High-quality play from both teams for the first 24 minutes of this contest. both teams shot over 50 percent from the field in the first quarter, producing uptempo basketball that created solid looks for both teams.
- Aron Baynes was the star early for the C's. He has found his rhythm from the midrange in the last couple of days and he extended that out to the 3-point line finally, hitting two straight 3s after starting his Celtic career 0-of-2 from downtown. He had just made one 3-point shot career prior to tonight.
- Terry Rozier also got into the shot making with a couple of strong drives through traffic and a pair of stepback 3s against bigger Toronto defenders. The duo combined for 22 points for the hosts in first quarter.
- The strong shooting start didn't matter much on the scoreboard early though since the Raptors were shooting just as well. All five members of the Raptors starting five scored five or more points early, with each shooting over 50 percent from downtown.
- A lack of guard depth proved to be an issue for the C's backcourt as Kadeem Allen was forced into a tough matchup against Fred Van Vleet, arguably the best Raptors reserve. Van Vleet got going early with nine points, including a couple of treys.
- Some surprising defense from Greg Monroe in the paint. He held his own against DeRozan on a couple of drives and snagged a couple steals with his good hands.
- Al Horford played the defacto point guard with the bench unit and held his own against pressure from Pascal Siakim. He punished him a couple of times with strong drives to the rim.
- Marcus Morris (1-of-5 from field) was rusty in his return, but finished the half off with a couple of nice layups against Raptors bigs in iso situations.
- The Celtics are expected to get some reinforcements on Saturday night with Al Horford and Marcus Morris both off the injury report. The frontcourt duo missed Wednesday's win over the Jazz due to sprained ankles. Jaylen Brown was a late addition to the injury report with a sore toe, but he will play. Shane Larkin (flu) is out, leaving the Celtics with one healthy point guard on the 15-man roster in Rozier.
- The Celtics have won fifth straight games overall, putting them back within striking distance of the Raptors for the top seed in the East. They trail by three games in the standings with six games to play.
- Normally, a three-game gap in the standings would be a tall hill to climb for the Celtics this late in the year but they do have some control over their own destiny with two head-to-head matchups against the Raptors over the next five days. Winning both of those games would give the Celtics the head-to-head tiebreaker at the end of the year as well.
- The Raptors will be at full strength for Saturday's matchup after DeMar DeRozan returned from California (personal reasons) to rejoin the team on Saturday in Boston.