BOSTON — It was Celtics 112, Hawks 99 on Saturday.
Are you ready for three more?
Game 1 of the Eastern Conference quarterfinals wasn’t a playoff game. It was a playoff beating. Boston led by ten points after one quarter. They led by 30 at the half. Atlanta’s three-point percentage through two quarters: 6.3%. Sure, the Hawks closed to 19 at the end of the third and at one point they whittled the lead down to 12 in the fourth. Big deal. All that did was prevent Luke Kornet from picking up a few postseason minutes.
If the 57-win regular season wasn’t enough of a reminder of the Celtics strength, Saturday was. Want offense? Three Celtics starters scored at least 24 points. Robert Williams hopped off the bench and chipped in 12. Jaylen Brown scored 29 points. Jayson Tatum added 25. Boston shot 47.7% from the floor and 39.4% from three. That big rebounding edge the Hawks held in the play-in game against Miami? Boston clobbered Atlanta 58-45 on the glass.
“I liked our intentionality,” said Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla. “Especially in the first half. Obviously, we went through a lull in the third quarter but I thought we kept playing. We kept trying to work through that lull. I thought we made enough plays. That’s good, now we know we can play better.”
Defensively, Boston, the NBA’s third most efficient during the regular season, was sharp. Atlanta shot 38.8% from three. They took 29 threes … and made five of them. “One of those nights,” said Dejounte Murray. Three Celtics—Al Horford, Derrick White and Marcus Smart—picked up two blocks apiece. Murray and Trae Young, the engines that power the Hawks offense, combined to shoot 15-43 from the floor.
“We got to make some shots,” said Young. “I think we got some good looks. Shots just weren’t going down. We got to get more stops when things like that happen.”
Poor Young. He had 25 points in Atlanta’s play-in win. In Game 1, he needed 18 shots to score 16. This could be an ugly series for Young. Whether it’s Smart, White or Malcolm Brogdon, for most of his minutes he will have an elite defender in front of him. Young missed his first five shots. He didn’t make a three—his only three—until the second quarter. On the other end, Boston hunted him at every opportunity. Young played just six minutes in the fourth quarter—the fewest of any starter.
“We took some lumps today,” said Hawks coach Quin Snyder. “Get back and get back after it on Tuesday.”
An Atlanta optimist will look at the second half, when the Hawks outscored the Celtics 55-38, as reason to be hopeful. “A lot of that,” said Jayson Tatum, “was self-inflicted.”
Even Snyder acknowledged when a team builds a significant halftime lead it’s difficult to remain focused. “Each game is its own story,” said Brown. “So we expect to take their best shot each game.”
The reality is the Celtics are good. Very good. Better than Atlanta. Perhaps better than everyone. It’s been a strange year in Boston. The team loses its head coach to a scandal days before training camp and doesn’t miss a beat the first two months of the season. They hit some adversity in the second half that put a microscope on Mazzulla (chews too much gum, doesn’t call enough timeouts) but they got through it. They have an MVP candidate (Tatum) and a soon-to-be All-NBA sidekick (Brown) to lead them. They finished the season with the best winning percentage (.695) since Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce wore green.
Atlanta will be better in Game 2. But Boston will, too. Tuesday’s game will be “nationally” televised on NBATV, where the NBA sends games they kind of want you to care about but understand if you don’t. Tests are coming for the Celtics. Just likely not until the next round.
