BOSTON CELTICS vs. DALLAS MAVERICKS
NBA Finals
Schedule:
Game 1: Thursday, 6/6, 8:30 p.m.
Game 2: Sunday, 6/9, 8 p.m.
Game 3: Wednesday, 6/12, 8:30 p.m.
Game 4: Thursday, 6/14, 8:30 p.m.
*Game 5: Monday, 6/17, 8:30 p.m.
*Game 6: Thursday, 6/20, 8:30 p.m.
*Game 7: Sunday, 6/23, 8 p.m.
All Games on ABC
*If Necessary. Home Road
DEPTH CHART
BOSTON
Guards: Jrue Holiday, Derrick White, Payton Pritchard, Svi Mykhailiuk, Jaden Springer
Wings: Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown, Sam Hauser, Oshae Brissett, Jordan Walsh
Bigs: Kristaps Porzingis, Al Horford, Luke Kornet, Xavier Tillman
DALLAS
Guards: Luka Doncic, Kyrie Irving, Dante Exum, Jaden Hardy, Brandon Williams
Wings: Derrick Jones Jr., Josh Green, Tim Hardaway, AJ Lawson, Olivier-Maxence Prosper
Bigs: Daniel Gafford, Dereck Lively, Maxi Kleber, Dwight Powell
INJURIES
Boston: None
Dallas: Luka Doncic (PROBABLE, Knee/ankle), Olivier-Maxence Prosper (QUESTIONABLE, ankle)
HOW BOSTON WINS
There are two ways to beat a team: Attack their weaknesses and take away their strengths. Boston’s offense has to do both to the Dallas defense.
Doncic and Irving are the weak spots. Despite all the recent chatter about how much better they're defending, those two have to be the focal point of Boston’s offensive attack. Picks need to be set high and they need to involve Irving and Doncic as often as possible.
They need to be set high because it is going to draw a defender, the big, out of the paint. No matter if it’s Gafford or Lively or Kleber, that big has to be drawn as far out as possible. That big is either going to be pulled way out of position or he’s going to stay in deep drop coverage, which will let Boston walk into a ton of in-rhythm 3-pointers.
The Celtics can’t just settle for all of those unless Tatum is in a monster groove. If that's the case, then the Mavs will naturally overreact, but the Celtics should still make it a point to drive anyway. When they do, they’ll draw a ton of Mavs defenders programmed to pack the paint and prevent anything at the rim. When that happens, it’s time to take away Dallas’ strength by running them ragged.
Here’s kind of what Boston should expect:
That's a lot of defenders and not much resistance on the corners. The Mavs have given up corner 3-pointers all season long with their defensive configuration and they’ve gotten away with it. They’ve allowed 11 corner 3-pointers per game in the playoffs and teams have shot 34.2%. That's mostly because neither the Wolves nor the Thunder had the personnel to make Dallas pay for that.
The Celtics do.
Boston hit 43% of their corner 3s this regular season but they’ve dipped to 34.8% in the playoffs. That's a drop that takes into account a little return to earth by Holiday and cold shooting by Hauser and White. A return to some normalcy in those spots could turn a 2-10 night from the corners into 4-10 or 5-10. Getting six to nine more points out of those shots alone could be enough to win this series for the Celtics.
But it goes beyond that. Each corner 3-pointer taken can also represent one passed up and swung to the wing. Boston’s drive-and-kick can draw someone’s attention enough to get to the next pass, and that could lead to an open 3-pointer, or one more swing to the most open 3-pointer, or a drive that collapses the defense again and starts the kick-swing-swing dominoes falling on the other side of the floor.
The Celtics are going to get all the 3-point shots they want. Prepare yourselves for that. We could see multiple 50-3PA games. If Boston shoots 38%, they’ll hit 19 of them and score 57 points from beyond the arc.
If they get 40 2-point shots and hit them at the 54% Minnesota did, That's 43 points and 100 total. Tack on 10-15 free throws and they're at 110-115 total for the game.
That's why I’ve set my magic number for this series at 110. Boston can get there on a regular basis just play playing well and shooting normally. They shot 38.8% from 3 in the regular season. Shooting 54% from 2 is average. Getting 10-15 made free throws is what all but three playoff teams have been able to accomplish and Boston is averaging 14.6.
If the Celtics just shoot normally, they’ll get to 110. If they get hot from 3, they can put 120 and they will win easily. If they shoot poorly, their defense will have to win them the game.
I think the way to beat Dallas is make things tough on Doncic but not overreact to him. We are all in awe of his powers, but he’s a good 3-point shooter not a great one. He’s capable of greatness but if he’s challenged, he’ll miss jumpers.
The Celtics need to take away his passing options, which means limit the lobs for Gafford and Lively on his drives, take away corner 3-point opportunities, and keep Irving on an island.
To summarize the plan: Make Doncic work is butt off at both ends. If he wants to do everything, then great, I want to see him do that. I want to see him defend at a high level and then come down and carry the offense. I don’t think he can do that for 48 minutes.
Lively, a rookie, is a target for me defensively. I think Boston will bait him into mistakes and we’ll see more turnovers than usual from him. I think he’s been a key to Dallas’ success as a connective tissue guy and without him, their offense gets clunky. So if they can get him a little frantic on offense with some confusing defensive coverages and then get him defending in space on the other end, things might not go well for him.
And then there's the matter of Irving, who I think will be the actual target of Boston’s most creative defenses. I’ve made this analogy before, but taking out Irving will be like taking out the back rotor on a helicopter. I think it will send the whole thing spiraling downward for Dallas and send Doncic into hero mode.
Frankly, the earlier Doncic gets into hero mode, the better. That means less passing and less defense. I’ll sign up for a Celtics vs. Doncic shootout because he can’t beat Boston four times out of seven by himself.
HOW DALLAS WINS
… or can he?
That's going to be what it takes to win this series for Dallas. The chants of “Luka! Luka! Luka!” will echo through the heavens as all of Slovenia chants in unison.
Boston will have to shoot poorly for the entire series to give Dallas the opening. I don’t think Dallas is going to take away the 3-point shots. They can try challenging them a little more, but their defense is their defense at this point. So Boston losing this series will involve a lot of bricks.
The Mavs can also dangle a lot of bait in front of Tatum and Brown to see if they’ll ditch the plan and just go iso matchup hunting all game long. The best way to beat the Celtics is to keep White, Holiday, Porzingis, and Horford from getting a bunch of shots. The Celtics could still win this way, but it gets a bit more difficult.
It will be imperative for Boston to start their offensive attack early in the shot clock so they have chances at multiple attacks. They have to be able to drive, kick, swing and drive again. They have to soften up the middle of the Mavs defense.
And then there are the margins, which Joe Mazzulla has preached since day one. The Mavs can stay close by grabbing offensive rebounds. They're averaging 11.4 per game, fourth-most in the playoffs. The Celtics can do a great job defensively and lose sight of crashers, which would undo everything.
Dallas can win this series by dominating those margins like offensive rebounding, points off turnovers, and fast break points. The days of Doncic walking the ball up the floor all the time are in the past. He’ll kick it ahead whenever he can, which can lead to spectacular, momentum-changing plays.
I don’t think the Mavs have enough to keep up with Boston if it’s just a straight up half court offense vs. defense battle, but it’s rarely that. The Mavs can win on the periphery to support Doncic if he is reaching ridiculous heights. Boston can’t allow that to happen.
HOW IT WILL GO
It is said over and over again that the playoffs are about matchups, and yet there are so many talking heads who are throwing the matchups out and getting into the ancillary stuff first.
No. This is about matchups, and Boston owns all but one half of one.
My two biggest questions have still not been answered. Who does Doncic guard? Who does Irving guard? The best answer I can come up with is Dallas starting Lively instead of Gafford and putting him on Tatum, Doncic taking Porzingis, Irving taking Holiday, and Jones on White and Washington on Brown. That's the only configuration that makes some sense to me … and that sucks for Dallas.
And frankly, it all sucks for Dallas.
Boston will attack Doncic and Irving every chance they get and one of two things is going to happen: Either Doncic and Irving play the best defense of their lives and get tired, or they start taking defensive plays off to save themselves for the offensive end. The Celtics will take either result.
The Celtics have spent the entire season as a really focused group. They have played 96 games so far without prolonged faltering. They have bounced back from every stinker or roadblock. They have persevered at every turn. Yes, they have had questions in the past, but this season is different. I’ve been saying that since October and I have yet to be proven wrong.
Why would they pick now to break from the plan?
Mazzulla has these guys ready. They are aware of what needs to be done.
This does not mean it will be easy. Doncic is special. He’s capable of winning games on his own, and he will probably do that. Irving is special, and he’ll help Doncic on those “nothing you can do about it” nights.
But they are not perfect. This Celtics team is built to pick “not perfect” apart.
This is Boston’s time. They not only know it, they know how to do it. They've not only been building to this moment, they're built for this moment.
“Whatever it is, I think the Celtics have found something. There's an incredible amount of work to do, and they’ll need the same amount of luck every champion gets along the way, but the Celtics are championship material.
“It’s not that they can win it all. They’ve been at ‘can win’ for a few years now.
“Now they should. And that's what we should expect.”
Celtics in six.