BSJ Game Report: Boston Celtics 132, Oklahoma City Thunder 123 - Grant Williams' career night helps C's survive late scare

Everything you need to know about the Boston Celtics' win over the OKC Thunder with BSJ insight and analysis

IN A NUTSHELL

Boston came out hot right away and built an early lead that got as high as 23. Tre Mann went off in the second quarter to take a significant bite out of that lead, but Boston recovered in the third quarter to get back up about 20 for most of the quarter. The lead got up to 26 early in the fourth, but OKC outscored Boston 39-22 the rest of the way to make it close. 

Box Score

HEADLINES

4-0 trip: Let’s focus on the big picture here. After dropping the game to Dallas at home, the Celtics were sitting in the fifth seed facing what seemed to be a daunting road trip. Eight days later, they're on a four-game winning streak and they're 9-1 in March. 

“What I told them was: We finished off 4-0,” Ime Udoka said afterwards. “It's not always going to be the prettiest game. Did well enough to maintain what we had, but we have to have more focus on specific guys, attention to detail as far as who their scorers are and who to help off of. Could've been much better as far as that."

Second in the East: That run moved them further up the standings when the Sixers, without Joel Embiid and James Harden, beat Miami. Philly, Boston, and Milwaukee are all tied, 2.5 games behind Miami, in second. Boston is percentage points behind Philly and Milwaukee because they have played two more games (Philadelphia and Milwaukee are 44-27, Boston is 45-28). 

OKC doesn’t quit: I think the Celtics expected the Thunder to just roll over when the lead got to 24 early in the fourth quarter. If there's one thing about this OKC team, though, it’s that they never stop playing hard. Once the C’s relaxed, they let the Thunder really get rolling and Boston didn’t have the legs to get it fully back under control. 

TURNING POINT

The real turning point was early in the game when Boston went up 20 in the first quarter. The Celtics played with their food after that, letting Mann get going in the second quarter and then Shai Gilgeous-Alexander in the fourth. The Thunder made their wild run down the stretch that needed a couple of big plays, but the Celtics came out and pushed that finish line out just far enough early on and that was enough.

FIVE UP 

Grant Williams: A career-high 20 points and his first 20-10 game as a pro. That tenth rebound was the big one because it was an offensive rebound off a corner crash that sealed the win. He got fouled and hit the two free throws that pushed Boston up to 132 points. 

Jayson Tatum: He kept his roll going in a big way, with 36 points on 11-19 shooting (5-11 3pt.). That's three straight games for Tatum with 30 or more points on fewer than 20 shots. He joins 43 other players to do that in NBA history in the regular season or playoffs. Only five players have a streak of four such games or more. LeBron James has the longest such streak at six. Tatum has been getting to the rim at will, drawing fouls and hitting his 3-pointers. At the rate he’s going, he’ll be a first-team All-NBA player. Oh, and he had 6 more assists in this game.

Jaylen Brown: He was pretty close to joining Tatum in this group, but his string ended after he finished with 25 points on 10-19 shooting (2-5 3pt). He also got to the rim basically whenever he wanted.

Payton Pritchard: His streak of perfection from deep ended, but he still shot 5-11 from 3 to score 18 points. He really had it cooking in the first quarter, when he shot 3-4 from deep and scored 9 points as Boston built their giant lead.

Derrick White: He finally hit a 3-pointer, but he took 5 of them so the one that fell didn’t exactly get him going. Still, he shot 5-10 overall and 7-7 from the line to put up a very nice 18-5-5 line. 

DOWN

The second-half defense: I don’t think any one guy played poorly overall in this game, but I didn't want to let that second-half defense off the hook. They let the Thunder shoot nearly 64% from the field and 50% from 3 on their way to 72 second-half points. 

TOP PLAYS

ONE TAKE KARALIS WILL PROBABLY REGRET LATER

- I’m not concerned about the fourth quarter at all.

At the end of a four-game trip, on a back-to-back, playing their third game in four nights, I’m absolutely not shocked at a team kicking its feet up with a 24 point fourth quarter lead. 

Am I happy about it? No. It’s not great at all that Tatum and Brown had to play nearly 39 minutes to close this game out. This was a great chance to rest the guys, but they let that slip out of their hands. 

At the same time, I totally get why they couldn't get it back. 

I ran the Falmouth Road Race a few years ago and they told us all to be careful because there's one last hill to climb at the end of the seven-mile course. After the sixth mile, with a whole world of regret screaming at me from my knees, I climbed what I thought was one last hill. 

Except it wasn’t. 

The problem is that because I thought I could just coast once I got to the bottom of that hill, I relaxed and let go mentally. When I realized I hadn’t gotten to the hill they were talking about, I nearly cried. My run slowed to a glorified walk, and not even one of those crazy power walks. After powering through and feeling like a champ for 6.75 miles, the last .25 nearly broke my soul. 

That's how I see this ending. Boston had run their road race, they had one more hill to climb, they got the lead to 24 with less than a quarter to go and they said “whew, nice win everyone,” without realizing that wasn’t the hill they needed all their energy for. 

They made it to the finish, though. Ime Udoka got to finger wag them a little in the locker room about letting go of the rope and being smarter about recognizing things, and they all still got to go home happy. 

They just swept the road trip and they’re tied for second in the East. Not bad.