BSJ Game Report: Boston Celtics 107, Atlanta Hawks 98 - Monster second half fuels important win

Everything you need to know about the Boston Celtics win over the Atlanta Hawks, with BSJ insight and information. 

IN A NUTSHELL

The Celtics opened the game with good energy behind Jaylen Brown. But it seemed that Boston was thrown for a loop when Brown went down with a sprained ankle. The rest of the half was a disheveled mess of turnovers and defensive mistakes. The second half, however, was all Boston. At one point, the 14 point halftime deficit was flipped to a 14 point Celtics lead, and the Celtics held on for a much-needed win. 

Box Score

HEADLINES

Jaylen Brown sprained his ankle: He was rolling early, but he sprained his ankle in a scary looking play that initially led me to believe it was another hamstring issue. The good thing is that he seems to be okay. 

“Got some swelling and soreness, obviously. He tried to give it a go in the back and wanted to come back out and play,” Ime Udoka said. “We just decided big picture, where we're at in the season and be smart. So we'll know more over the next few days.”

Second-half defense: The Celtics beat the Hawks by 23 in the second half, holding them to 33 points, 33.3% shooting overall, and 2-16 (12.5%) from 3. 

“We did a great job in the first half of really just being physical, but we were fouling too much,” Grant Williams said. “So it was just about adjusting to what the refs were calling as well as putting a little bit more pressure on the guys that were the primary ball handlers and making them not as comfortable as they were.”

All-around contributions:  Before the game, I wrote in my three things to watch, “Can (Derrick) White, Grant Williams, and Payton Pritchard give the Celtics enough scoring to counterbalance Bogdanovic’s impact?” 

Boston’s bench outscored Atlanta’s 39-37. White and Williams had 18 each to trump Bogie’s 25.

TURNING POINT

I could pick the 14-0 run to start the second half that made this a tie game. That is certainly the big one that flipped this game from an ugly mess that drew online trolls out of their holes. However, I’m going to go with the stretch that salted the game away in the fourth quarter where a ridiculous Marcus Smart blocked shot turned into a Grant Williams 3, Making it an 11 point Boston lead instead of six. Then a Smart steal and save on the sideline led to another Williams 3 to push it to 14 with 3:11 to go and salt the game away. 

SIX UP

Jayson Tatum: 33 points, 8 rebounds, 7 assists and just 2 turnovers. He shot 12-25 overall (but only 3-10 from 3). He ramped up the attack in the second half and two of his most important dimes were to Grant Williams in the corner for the turning point 3-pointers.

Marcus Smart: The chase-down block and the sideline steal were spectacular Smart plays, but he also did a lot of little things, including making sure Derrick White got the ball in the third quarter when he was getting hot. 

Grant Williams: Another 50% night from deep, and the two he hit were the big ones that put the game away. 

“It’s kind of what I do now. I just have to shoot to make that shot and I’m gonna trust that JT’s gonna put me in the right position,” he said. “I just have to be confident enough to take that shot. For me, a couple years back, I might’ve shot-faked or hesitated. So for me now, it’s just a matter of letting that thing fly and trusting the work that I put in.”

Robert Williams: Another 4 offensive rebounds on an otherwise quiet offensive night for him. But the 13 overall rebounds and 2 blocks were big. 

Derrick White: He had his turn to carry the team in the third. When the Celtics were starting to settle a little too much, White came in and got aggressive. 

“We kind of talked about it at halftime and put the package together for Derrick to get some looks,” Udoka said. “They took Trae Young off of Marcus, we were posting up a few times there and put him on Derrick, so we had some advantages as far as that, and he just made the right plays attacking downhill. They started doubling Jayson and everybody else got to kind of eat off of him, and so Derrick was huge.”

Aaron Nesmith: He was 0-5 from the field, 0-2 from 3, yet he was a plus-10 mostly because of his energy and rebounding. 

“The run we had to start the quarter and the 33 point second half in general, I think he was a big part of that,” Udoka said. “Didn't score a lot on the stat sheet or Payton (Pritchard) as well. But they really impacted the game and brought physicality and I think that's something that Aaron does on a day to day basis. I will give them credit for being ready to be a professional and being ready when called upon.”

DOWN

Basically everyone in the first half: I’ll just use this space as a blanket caveat that basically all of these players who finished in the “up,” and even those who I didn’t mention, had down first halves. Tatum took too many 3-pointers, Smart turned the ball over too much, Al Horford wasn’t hitting anything. I think ultimately everyone turned it around to have an overall good game, but I just want to acknowledge that a lot of guys were not great early on.

TOP PLAYS

Clear the way for Tatum 💪 pic.twitter.com/pagniWt5VG

— Celtics on NBC Sports Boston (@NBCSCeltics) March 2, 2022

ONE TAKE KARALIS WILL PROBABLY REGRET LATER

Put a pin in that second half comeback … that could be a pivotal moment in this season. 

I’m not trying to be overly dramatic about a comeback win against a team fighting for the play in. I mean, Bogdan Bogdonovic even said after the game, "when you're up 15 and they lose one of the top two guys on the team and if you're not able to win that game, you're not a good team.”

Maybe that's why I think this second half was so critical. 

In full context, we have Boston coming in off a loss to Indiana and a rock-fight win over the Pistons. Everyone acknowledges that they slowed down a bit after the All-Star break, so this game started a pretty important series of tests for Boston. 

With the team reeling a little after Brown’s injury and the Hawks not feeling Boston’s defenders quite enough, it was starting to feel a little ugly. The vibes at the half were not great, and the usual suspects were back at their keyboards and making some noise. (I have a mental list of 5-10 people either here, on Twitter, or in my podcast YouTube comments than I can count on to be quite loud when things aren’t going well, but they don’t say anything when the team is winning). 

And so a loss to the Hawks, especially one that looked like the first half, would have opened the “here we go again” floodgates. 

“I'm constantly talking to the guys. No let-up,” Smart said. “For us, we can't let doubt creep into our minds. We're going to have games like this. It's just how we respond. We just challenged ourselves to go out there and respond. We want to be the first team to hit in that second half, and we did. That's what kind of kept us afloat and keep getting that momentum for us to build.

“Early on in the season, we come out in that third quarter, that lead goes to 30. Then there's no way for us to fight back in it. We came out. We maintained their surges, then we went on surges of our own."

I don’t know how the rest of this season will go, but this is one of those moments that maybe could be something moving forward. The season is full of these little things that fuel runs, and coming out in the second half, without Jaylen Brown, and looking dominant again feels like it could be important moving forward.