BSJ Game Report: Celtics 119, Bucks 116 - C's avoid collapse in Jaylen Brown's best game of the season

Everything you need to know about the Celtics win over the Bucks, with BSJ insight and analysis.

IN A NUTSHELL

Boston came out strong behind a Jaylen Brown-fueled 10-0 run to start and a 50% shooting quarter overall. The lead grew to 21 as the hot shooting continued with the bench unit, but second-chance points for the Bucks helped cut it to 14 at the half. The third quarter was pretty even but it got frantic after Kristaps Porzingis sat with four fouls. Boston ended up winning the quarter, and then carried the momentum into the fourth to go back up 20. But a late run cut it to down to three but Jayson Tatum and Jrue Holiday salted it away from the free throw line.

Box Score

HEADLINES 

- 42 minutes of great basketball: The Celtics expectedly came out with a lot more purpose against the Bucks on ESPN. They played with great pace, pushing the ball even after makes, moving the ball to rack up assists, and swarming defensively and closing out possessions. They were up 12 after one, had six assists, shot 50 percent, held Milwaukee to 27%, and no second chance points. Ultimately, the Bucks got 19 second-chance points the rest of the way, but it was a small price to pay with how much the defense bothered Giannis Antetokounmpo and Damian Lillard.  

- Six minutes that almost ruined it: The lead was 17 with 5:44 to go. The Celtics had played with a generally comfortable lead the whole night, so that little mini-flurry Boston used to push that lead to 17 probably felt like the game was wrapped up. The Celtics then took a couple of hero shots, missed some makeable ones, and slipped just enough defensively to let Lillard get going some. Milwaukee is too good, even on an off night, to let them feel okay for any stretch. At least this time Boston made their free throws. 

“I felt like as you feel them going on a run the pressure starts to build up and then some of those shots don’t go in the way they went in, so just shoot it with confidence and keep playing the same way as if it’s the first quarter or the second quarter,” Brown said. “Don’t put too much pressure on yourself, just come out and do what we’ve been doing all game. I feel like that’s what will help us prevent from getting into those moments instead of kind of overthinking it.

- Jaylen Brown’s best game: More on this separately, but this is the Jaylen Brown that everyone has been looking for. This was easily his best game of the season. He shot incredibly well without forcing too many 3-pointers (10-16 overall, 3-5 3pt) and he had eight assists. Sign me up for a full season of this guy. 

TURNING POINT

The Boston lead was 18 and Milwaukee was walking it down slowly. It got down to 13 with 6:16 to go in the fourth and I said in the live game coverage that Boston desperately needed a bucket and a stop.

Luckily, that's what they got in that moment. Al Horford caught Brook Lopez’s block of a Brown layup and tipped it in. Malik Beasley missed a 3 and Horford found a streaking Brown for a layup to put Boston back up 17. 

Turns out those four points were huge because the lead was whittled all the way down to three. That stretch was juuuuuust enough of a pad to keep the lead rather than go into a back-and-forth finish. 

THINGS I LIKED

- Brown’s passing: I’ll say this a bunch tonight, so I won’t belabor this point. He saw the floor incredibly well. I can go back to the beginning of the Charlotte game and sorta, kinda, maybe argue that he’s starting to string together some really good vision games. He got away from it later against Charlotte, so it was nice to see he didn’t completely abandon it. 

- Sam Hauser: Huge bounceback after the 1-9 night. His line wasn’t mind blowing, but he was a team-high +10 in this game. This is turning into quite the nice Hauser season. 

Oh, and this happened. 

Don’t worry, much more on this play is coming up separately. 

- The defense: The 113.7 defensive rating is going to hurt their overall number, but that number was destroyed by giving up 25 points over the final six minutes. They gave up 91 points prior to that on 41.7% shooting. 

I’m not trying to excuse away the late slide. I’m just saying that for 42 minutes, we saw a team capable of being the top defense in the league. 

- Kristaps Porzingis: He really bothered Antetokounmpo at the rim.

“He's gotten better in the last few games at being there regardless of who he is guarding, protecting the rim, bringing late help,” Joe Mazzulla said. “So I thought the three layers of our defense were great for the majority of the game, and when you can do the first two, it's easier for him to help when you're keeping guys in front of you and you're not giving up straight line drives.”

And his chemistry with Brown continues to be one of the fun storylines of the season. I felt like things really started to get messy for Boston when he sat with foul trouble and when he left the game late. I’m still of the opinion that he needs to be attached to Brown’s hip in the substitution pattern. 

Derrick White: He’s just stability for this team. It wasn’t his cleanest game (six turnovers), but it just feels more comfortable when he’s on the floor. 

The bench: Hauser, Horford, and Payton Pritchard won the bench battle 31-22. Boston will be hard to beat when they win the bench points. 

THINGS I DIDN’T LIKE

Jayson Tatum: Not his best shooting game. I think he took a couple of hero shots that could have been avoided. I also think he was frustrated by a lack of calls. To be fair, they let a lot of contact go across the board. 

Jrue Holiday’s offense: It felt like he was pressing a little bit. His defense was really good, though, so I’m not even going to say he had a bad game. He had a bad offensive game. 

The final six minutes: They need to finish better, plain and simple. More in a moment. 

HIGHLIGHTS

JB IS PUTTING ON A SHOW 🤯🤯 pic.twitter.com/7qXqc69P3z

— Celtics on NBC Sports Boston (@NBCSCeltics) November 23, 2023

Jayson Tatum really just went through 3 Bucks 🥵 pic.twitter.com/bSgOEbL2NZ

— Celtics on NBC Sports Boston (@NBCSCeltics) November 23, 2023

ONE TAKE KARALIS WILL PROBABLY REGRET LATER

- The end of game thing yadda yadda yadda: 

I know we were all watching the fourth quarter unfold thinking “here we go again.” The Celtics haven't been known as the best closing team in the world, and here they were giving up another lead to sweat out what should have been garbage time. 

There are a couple of things at play here, though. The first thing is that in the modern NBA, no lead is safe. I hate to tell you, but even an 18 point lead in the fourth is tough to hold onto if it’s reached too early. 

The lead was 16 with 4:57 to go. A couple of misses by Boston, a few makes by Milwaukee, and suddenly it’s 10. A little loss of composure later, along with a couple of good shooters finally hitting a few shots, and yeah, it’s a three point game in a blink. It doesn’t take much in a world of 3-pointers and the team right behind you in the standings getting desperate. 

“It's really hard to guard at the end of the game like that, and you're telling your team, ‘No threes, no transition, no offensive rebounds,’” Mazzulla said. “I think we’ve got to guard the 3-point line at the end of the games better. Like in the Charlotte game, they scored in the first six-to-eight seconds of the shot clock on four possessions and then tonight, two possessions they scored in the first six-to-eight seconds. So we’ve just got to guard the three well, a little bit better, and then we’ve got to hold them to one shot. 

“It's hard to guard teams like that at the end of the game when you know, you're right. It feels like we're letting it off a little bit and they're in urgency mode, and so we’ve got to fight to be in urgency mode as well.”

And that's the second thing. It’s the hardest thing. History isn’t on Boston’s side when it comes to that, but human nature might be. At some point these guys are going to have to grow up and figure this out. They're too good to be completely incapable of it. 

And hey, they did the things against Milwaukee that they didn’t do against Charlotte. That counts for something. 

“I think that we made some key plays there,” Horford said. “JT getting to the free throw line and willing his way to the basket. Before that, I think that we let our foot off the gas a little bit on both ends. And we allowed them to get back in the game."

So, one the plus side, they regrouped in time to hang on for the win. They made the plays they had to down the stretch. Whatever consternation there may be about the end of the game or their road trip, Boston is still 12-3 and undefeated at home. 

If they can keep winning games while they figure this out, then great. But they do need to figure that part out. 

Next Up: The Celtics play a Friday afternoon matinee, 2:30 p.m., in Orlando in their third In-Season Tournament game.