Four takeaways from the Celtics' dominant win over the Sixers

A mix of reaction and analysis from the TD Garden after the Celtics' handily beat the Sixers in their final regular season matchup of the year despite missing Kemba Walker and Enes Kanter.

1. That defensive film session from two weeks ago is still having an impact: Two weeks ago, the Celtics had a lengthy film session in the wake of a three-game losing streak. It was focused solely on poor defense that had produced plenty of slippage from what had formerly been a top-5 defense. The Celtics weren’t playing physical and keeping teams on their heels and they didn’t have the size to overcome that lack of energy. A blowout win against the Lakers was a strong response to the session but the lingering impact has still been felt over the past two weeks, leading up to Saturday night against the Sixers. During those past seven games, Boston has been the best defensive team in the NBA allowing just 102 points per 100 possessions. Their performance against the Sixers may have been the team’s best effort yet, limiting a Philly team to 36.9 percent shooting from the field and 21.2 percent from downtown. Outside of Ben Simmons (23 points), no Sixers starter shot above 40 percent from the field and that was in large part due to the defensive pressure the C’s exhibited all night long, pushing the Sixers out from their preferred spots in the halfcourt.

“Yeah, we talked a lot, if the ball gets into the operating area or too deep against these guys it’s hard, because they’re so big and strong,” Brad Stevens said. “We saw a few examples of that tonight, specifically with Simmons getting us on some actions. But I thought our guys really tried to pressure as well as they could and push things out.”

The Sixers are by no means an offensive juggernaut (especially without Josh Richardson) but they simply could not outwork or bully the C’s in this one. The hosts held their ground against Philly's bulk and punished speed mismatches on the other end, reaffirming their identity as a defense-first team after some slippage during early January.

2. Jaylen Brown finally showed up against the Sixers: The swingman scored a total of 22 points in his first three games against Philadelphia this year, shooting a horrific 8-of-27 from the field in the process. With Kemba Walker sidelined due to a sore knee on Saturday, that type of performance would simply not be possible if the C’s hoped to pull out a win in this one. Brown responded to the added workload with a game-high 32 points despite going an ugly 1-of-10 from 3-point line. He made up for it inside the arc by knocking down 12 of his 13 shots inside the arc, using his speed against a flat-footed Sixers frontline all night long.

“He’s been really good,” Brad Stevens said. “I said the other day, we’ve talked all along that it’s more important to be playing like an All-Star than to be named one. And nobody exemplifies that better. He’s done a great job. I think he played really well the other night, but tonight he was really good. Very aggressive, very good at picking his spots. But he came out, even on that first possession, you knew he was going to be ready to roll.”

“Just trying to be aggressive,” Brown said of his performance. “Trying to get a win. I haven't played as well against Philly as I would have liked the first three times so tonight I wanted to make sure I left my imprint on the game.”

Brown not only roasted Al Horford on the offensive end but he held up well in the post against his former teammate all night, limiting him just 9 points despite the size mismatch. Brown has taken ownership of his defensive assignments at the power forward spot for much of the year and the results have been promising for a team that thrives while playing small.

“From his rookie year when we were telling him to slow down in transition to now, when we tell him to go, do your thing, it just comes with the hard work he’s putting in each and every year,” Marcus Smart said of Brown. “I think we’ve seen his progression as a basketball player, as an individual off the court, but he’s definitely putting in the work. Everybody is happy for Jaylen. As I said earlier I think he should have been an all-star, think he was snubbed, but we know what he brings, know what he can do, and know he should have been there.”

3. Daniel Theis finally got the best of Joel Embiid for one night: This has been one of the bigger mismatches in the NBA over the past three seasons thanks to Embiid’s size and strength advantage. The All-Star center (1-of-11) clearly didn’t have it on Saturday night and that was largely of his own doing. He settled for jumpers, missed bunnies in the paint and coughed up the ball on turnovers three times in the opening five minutes.

Still, Brad Stevens elected to minute-for-minute with Theis on Embiid during his 23 minutes and the German center worked his butt off to ensure Embiid didn’t get prime position in the post. The C’s also mixed in plenty of double teams to keep Embiid guessing which helped prevent the Philly offense from getting into any kind of rhythm all night.

“I thought Theis played as hard as he could,” Stevens said. “But you can play as hard as you can against that guy sometimes and the ball goes in and there’s not much you can do about it from a physical standpoint. We’re just trying to make it as hard as possible. But probably more one of those nights from him than anything special that we did.”

4. The Celtics bench is trying to convince Danny Ainge not to make any major additions ahead of the trade deadline: Brad Wanamaker was a DNP-CD against the Sixers last month in Philly but got the nod in this one and delivered arguably his best performance of the year, scoring a season-high 15 points including the first two dunks of his career. The 30-year-old point guard has been marred in a slump for much of the past two months so any type of offensive boost from him has been hard to come by after a hot start to the year. The tide turned in this one in that he not only attacked in transition but also knocked down a pair of 3s during what was an otherwise cold night for the C’s (8-of-30) from downtown.

“Brad’s been very good all year,” Stevens said. “Obviously 15 points off the bench is something that, with Kemba out at that position especially, we needed badly. He did a good job. When they went on their runs in the first, he hit some shots to keep us ahead and then I thought he made some really aggressive plays tonight.”

With Kanter sidelined, Stevens has also elected to use his bench to play super small-ball with the PF/C combo of Semi Ojeleye and Grant Williams over the past week. The versatile duo has the strength to hold ground against bigs in the post and managed to hold their ground and keep the Sixers from dominating the glass.

“They’ve been good the last few games, “Stevens said. “Certainly on that road trip. The Semi/Grant 4/5 is not traditional, but it is very strong. It’s hard to post because they’re so strong and they can both move their feet and guard. So you’re able to switch a lot with that group and not lose a whole lot from a perimeter defense standpoint. And then if we’re a little bit bigger around them with our wings, we’ve got a lot of versatility. So that’s been good. And then just keep playing within what they do best and that’s been a good combination the last couple weeks.”