BOSTON -- The second nights of back-to-backs are rarely easy, no matter who you play. And the Jordi Fernandez-led Brooklyn Nets have always played the Boston Celtics tough. Tuesday night was no different.
The end of the third quarter lifted the Celtics back into a game in which the Nets had their number. Mo Wagner found a rhythm. Michael Porter Jr. made a ton of shots. Even Chaney Johnson made a difference with his elite hustle (and impressive shooting).
When the fourth rolled around, the game was a back-and-forth affair. Porter's shot-making kept Brooklyn alive as Jayson Tatum tried to do the same for the Celtics.
Porter rained down a relentless downpour of triples. The Celtics didn't stay attached, and when the screen came, they got stuck. And Porter feasted.
Tatum flipped on his playmaker mode with under a minute to go. He found Derrick White rolling to the basket, threading the needle on a frame-perfect pass. White finished with an and-one dunk to put the Celtics up by three with 33.7 seconds to go.
But the game wasn't over. Neemias Queta fouled Julius Randle on a rebound attempt up four. He made the first, then intentionally missed the second. But the Celtics had subbed in Mitchell Robinson for rebounding purposes because Queta fouled out.
Robinson missed both free throws. Then, rookie Mikel Brown Jr. nailed a fading, contested three in the corner to tie the game. Overtime basketball.
Brown's clutch shot-making continued in overtime with a monster three. Tatum kept Boston alive with his drives to the cup, but the Nets jumped out to an early OT lead, meaning the Celtics were working from behind.
A successful Nets challenge flipped the game on its head. White could have had game-winning free-throw attempts, but the call was reversed, giving Brooklyn the ball back up by one with 6.1 seconds remaining.
Brown got the ball on the inbound, but instead of holding it and waiting for an intentional foul, he went up for a layup. Paul George contested him at the rim, and Brown missed, giving the Celtics the ball back down by one with 2.3 seconds left.
The Celtics inbounded the ball, found Tatum on the move, and he pulled up from the mid-range: Splash. Boston walked away with a 125-124 victory.
Up: End of the third quarter
This is when the entire game changed. For the first half of the game (and the first half of the third), the Celtics looked awful. The hustle wasn't there. The offensive consistency. The poise.
Then, Sam Hauser nailed a 3-pointer with 2:59 to go in the third. It made the game 77-75 Nets. He forced a turnover on the next play. Then, a couple of possessions later, Baylor Scheierman nailed a three in front of the Nets' bench to make it 79-78.
The rest of the quarter was a constant state of TD Garden uproar. Some great defense by Scheierman on Randle. A dive on the floor for a loose ball. A Jayson Tatum triple. Another Hauser three.
Boston completely chopped down the Nets' lead in this span. Scheierman's hustle and Hauser's 3-point buckets led the charge.
Down: Three-point shooting
The Celtics couldn't buy a bucket for the third two-and-a-half quarters. It was ugly. Even the open ones didn't look like they had a chance.
By the end of the first half, they somewhat abandoned the three-ball. Not completely, but Boston clearly made a more concerted effort to get downhill. It worked. Kind of.
That well dried up eventually. But in the third quarter, Boston generated a ton of open threes. They just didn't fall.
Even when Payton Pritchard found himself wide-open beyond the arc with enough time to take a dribble, he came up short. It was a brutal display.
Up: Jayson Tatum
This was a good Tatum performance. The threes weren't falling early, so he moved away from them. Tatum worked to get downhill and earned himself ample opportunities at the free-throw line.
He also did a great job building chemistry with Robinson, Queta, and even Luka Garza. The Tatum-led pick-and-roll was one of Boston's best (and only) sources of offense.
There were some lapses. Some bad fouls. A relative lack of rebounding (that might have been a team-wide problem). But overall, and especially offensively, Tatum was impressive. And Boston needed it.
When the fourth quarter came around, Tatum's driving helped keep Boston afloat. This may have been his most aggressive game yet, and it's off the heels of a Chicago Bulls game in which he was very aggressive. A good sign of things to come.
Oh yeah, and the game-winner was cool, too. Tatum finished the night with 40 points, five rebounds, eight assists, one block, and no turnovers. He shot 10-of-20 from the field, 2-of-7 from deep range, and 18-of-22 from the free-throw line. It was the most free throws Tatum has ever attempted in a game.
Down: Turnovers
It's been a messy start to the year for the Celtics. For the third game of four, White had some rough turnovers. It was really a team-wide issue, though.
The Fernandez Nets always play with a ton of ball pressure. That was no different on Tuesday night, and you could feel it. It made the Celtics sloppier.
Whenever the Celtics' offense struggled to get a possession going, things went south. There were too many balls thrown away. Too many missed passing opportunities.
Up: Jordan Walsh
For the second straight game, Jordan Walsh was one of the highlights of the night. It was more than just the hustle. He showed off some offensive flashes, too.
The threes fell at a solid clip for Walsh, and outside of a couple of miscues, he looked confident shooting them. He even nailed an after-the-whistle one-legged floating triple. It obviously didn't count, but that should tell you how confident he was playing.
The rebounding was there for Walsh, too. If he does nothing else, he's going to crash hard, and that makes a difference. Walsh ended with 15 points, six rebounds, one assist, and one steal while shooting 5-of-8 from the floor and 3-of-5 from distance.
Down: Rebounding
A quick glance at the box score wouldn't reveal a massive rebounding problem, but watching the game, it felt like it was. Brooklyn looked meaner on the glass.
The Nets just seemed to want it more when it came to rebounding. They were using offensive rebounds (and the drawn fouls that came with crashing) as a means to keep their offense afloat.
Brooklyn's half-court offense was pretty messy. It survived off tough shot-making, playing off the Celtics' turnovers, and crashing the glass. And Boston didn't do a good enough job of shutting those faucets off.
Bonus down: Closing out
The Celtics gave up too many quality 3-point looks on Tuesday night. Part of it was by design (I believe), but not in the way you may think.
From watching the game and seeing how the Celtics have played defense this year, it seems as though they were okay leaving some shooters to help in the paint. They like to close out late on some guys if it means limiting shots at the rim.
The problem is, the Celtics didn't do a good enough job of closing out against the Nets. Shots that should have been somewhat contested by a late, running close-out became wide-open shots for Brooklyn.
Hustle was the problem. The Celtics didn't execute their defensive scheme well enough, and it helped the Nets get in a rhythm.