Final: Celtics 130, Lakers 108 - C's attack wears Lakers down in blowout

Game 16: Boston Celtics (7-8) vs. Los Angeles Lakers (8-8)
TD Garden
7:30 - NBC Sports Boston, ESPN

PROBABLE STARTERS

BOSTON: Dennis Schröder, Jayson Tatum, Al Horford, Grant Williams, Marcus Smart

LOS ANGELES: LeBron James, Anthony Davis, Carmelo Anthony, Avery Bradley, Russel Westbrook.

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW

- Jaylen Brown is still out as he recovers from his strained right hamstring. “He’s close, he’s raring to play,” Ime Udoka said. “We’re going to hold him back a little bit, myself and the medical staff. He really wanted to play tonight - let alone back home in Atlanta - but we feel he needs a little more time. He’s ramped it up over the last week or so. He’s not quite ready but he’ll be back soon.

- Robert Williams (left knee) is out with left knee soreness.  

- LeBron James is available. He was dealing with an abdominal strain. He’ll test his injury and then determine whether he’s a go. Trevor Ariza, Kendrick Nunn, Austin Reeves, and Jay Huff are out.

- The Lakers are 4-1 in games decided by 3-points or less. Their losses have often been bad.

- The Celtics are favored by 1.5

GOING A LITTLE DEEPER

- The Celtics are hoping for a few breaks at home. 

The Celtics are 2-3 at home, so there’s nothing guaranteed about anything as they open a four-game homestand. That record is one of a few things the C’s hope will start to normalize. 

“Hopefully we can get on a little roll, find some footing,” Josh Richardson said. “But I think it has been a good early challenge for us having to figure things out in hostile environments.”

They certainly have figured a few things out. They are now the league’s 11th best defense, and it’s fourth over the last nine games. The offense is rough, but they are generating a lot of open looks that are just not falling. Even though the team isn’t getting the wins to reinforce some of Ime Udoka’s lessons, they’re seeing the progress.

“Defensively what we’ve done on the court, and what we’ve seen in the standings and the rankings, we’re right there,” Udoka said. “The thing we’re doing offensively is passing the ball and making the plays we want to, we’re not shooting as well ... we’re feeling that’s going to balance out eventually. We’re not getting discouraged because we’re playing the right way.”

At some point, the Celtics hope, that will result in an appropriate levelling of wins and losses. Until the shots start falling the Celtics have to be better about keeping level heads in the clutch.

“I think we just got to finish games, for one,” Richardson said. “I think we had two -- I say probably three or four games we should have won in that stretch. But hindsight is 2020, so of course we're gonna look back and be like ‘we could have done this, that, this better,’ but I honestly think that our record should be better than what it shows.”

THREE THINGS TO WATCH FOR

1. ATTACK! Not only are the Celtics better when they are attacking and aggressive, the Lakers are second-worst in the NBA in opponent points in the paint. They are giving up 50.6 points in the paint per game, so any amount of passing around the perimeter and settling for jumpers is counterproductive. The Celtics need to drive and challenge the Lakers.

2. Be active on defense and run! Feeding into that points in the paint number are the 17.5 points off turnovers (14.1 fastbreak points) the Lakers are giving up. The Celtics need to play focused defense and feed into that number. There is an opportunity to get out into transition and put up some points. 

3. When will the shots fall? If the Celtics are aggressive and getting out in transition, then watch for the shots to maybe start falling for these guys tonight. There’s nothing like some easy layups to get people feeling good. There’s also nothing like a bunch of easy layups to make the defense collapse. The C’s have already generated plenty of open looks (8th in the NBA in wide open field goal attempts) but they haven’t gotten them to fall (25th in field goal percentage). Some early transition buckets could be enough to build up the confidence and knock down some shots. 

GAME THREAD

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