Coby kills Boston: How the C's let White get loose for Steph Curry-like night

Coby White can hit 3-pointers, but he's not a great 3-point shooter. At 35%, he's fine. He's adequate.

But teams would prefer not to let him get hot. He's hit 50% or better from deep 14 times this season, nine of them on nights where he took seven or more 3-pointers.

His highest volume nights have generally been his best nights, showing that he'll keep bombing away if he's feeling it. He shot 7-12 against Boston, his second-most makes and attempts in a game this season. He's taken 10 or more on three separate occasions this year, shooting 47.1%, 50% and, against Boston, 58.3%. In fact, he's shot better than 44% in all but two of the 10 games he's taken 9 or more 3-pointers.

The performance against Boston in Chicago's 121-99 win Friday night was one of his best. Here's how it happened.



His first 3 came midway through the second quarter. Tristan Thompson had picked him up but then ditched him to switch back onto Daniel Theis. I don't know if he expected Jabari Parker to go get White, but he expected something different to happen.

The most likely scenario here is that this was supposed to be a "veer," which is a defensive form of switching that essentially lets a driver past a defender who then switches at the last second into the passing lane of where the ball was supposed to go.

Think of it as the NBA defense version of an NFL lineman's duties on a screen pass. They sort of block but then let the D linemen through so they can then switch to their primary duty, getting downfield and blocking. A veer is sort of the photonegative of that where the defender allows himself to get beat, but when the ball handler feels like he's drawn two, the initial defender switches over to where the pass is supposed to go. Sometimes he deflects it, sometimes he just gets up on the shooter. Walker did neither here.

"We were just late. We didn’t get there in time, and then we were scrambling. They hurt us on our late veers," Stevens said.

White then hit a contested 3 over Kemba Walker before the Celtics were victimized by interior passing.



Two guys went to Nikola Vucevic, then two went to Thaddeus Young.

Grant Williams didn't need to overcommit this strongly. Luke Kornet was there in time. He basically invited Young to pass to White. It was a costly overreaction. Now White is feeling it.



Walker switched, leaving Kornet on White. White saw Kornet dropped way off him and took a pretty easy jumper.

At this point, we have a late reaction, an overreaction, and a mismatch on three of White's four 3-pointers. It's not great. Boston's defense was poor throughout the game.

It got worse.



The Celtics tried a zone to deal with Vucevic and his passing. Tacko Fall is patrolling the middle but the Celtics zone defense was not good in this game.

With Marcus Smart in the position he's in, Jayson Tatum has to be in better position. He's way too low, even for a zone. He should have been standing near the Bulls logo with the ball on the high opposite side. No one is making that pass into the corner from where Zach LaVine is, especially if Tatum is angled properly.

It's a zone so even if there's a backdoor cut, he's got Tacko freakin' Fall at the rim. They're fine. Instead, White gets a pretty easy look.

White mixed in a tough shot over Walker, his second truly contested 3 of the night before capping it with a warmup-level look.



Vucevic had been picking them apart all night. Evan Fournier does the worst thing a guy can do on defense: double as a guy a is looking directly at him. Vucevic was begging for that double so he could pass out of it. Theis cleared the way for that 3 by cutting to the middle and taking Tatum with him. Vucevic ends up getting a pretty easy assist out of this play.

Boston's defense was out of sorts most of the night. Some of it can be excused because Robert Williams and Jaylen Brown were out, leaving guys like Fournier and Kornet, who are new and still learning, to make plays. But also, some of this was just bad.

The Celtics gave up wide-open looks the whole night. White is averaging 2.2 made 3's per game but he got seven of them in this one, putting up a Stephen Curry-like stat line. They shouldn't be making some of the mistakes they're making at this point of the season. The lack of practice time is hurting them, for sure, but they are still NBA-level players who should have better fundamentals.