BOSTON — The trouble for the Warriors midway through the NBA Finals is Celtics center Rob Williams can reach places they can’t go.
He can spring for two offensive rebounds in a 30-second span like he did in the fourth quarter of Game 3, including one he plucked while Draymond Green actively boxed him out.
He can flush a rafter-grazing alley-oop, like his slam that put the Warriors to bed at 112-98 with less than four minutes left.
And even on a bum knee, Williams can fly from the paint to swat a Steph Curry jumper into the second row, one effort play in a green ocean of them that swallowed Curry and held him to a single field goal in the fourth quarter with Golden State’s offense lost at sea, the Celtics finally pulled away, 116-100.
Back in the regular season, Williams unlocked Boston’s league-leading defense when the coaching staff positioned him on the wing as a permanent help defender. Now, he might key the Finals, a clash of the Warriors’ unmatched skill against the Celtics’ swarming length and athleticism.
“We want to try to impose our will and size in this series. It’s going to be a back-and-forth battle as far as that,” Celtics coach Ime Udoka said postgame, “But when we get nights like this from (Williams) and Al (Horford), obviously it pays dividends for us.”
Despite Williams’ eight points, team-high 10 boards and four blocks, it wasn’t all perfect. Clinging to a fragile 7-point lead late in the third quarter, Williams dropped against a sideline pick-and-roll and gave Klay Thompson space to fire an open 3. Thompson drilled it.
Udoka berated Williams immediately and barked for his young center to step closer to Thompson. The 24-year-old thought he had an excuse.
“I told him I thought I was up,” Williams said. “Just playing against great players, you can’t give them an inch of space at all.”
So, he didn’t.
Williams, a 6-foot-9 pogo stick, bounced his way to four rebounds, three steals and a block over the fourth quarter. He finished a game-best plus-21. After the game, Jaylen Brown said he believes Williams would have been a Defensive Player of the Year candidate equal to Marcus Smart had he stayed healthy.
What was inarguable Wednesday was how the Celtics dominated the paint.
They scored 52 points in the paint compared to 24 in Game 2, when Williams hardly played. Golden State cashed barely half its field goals inside the paint, where Williams altered or warded off more than a dozen shots. Meanwhile, the Celtics claimed more than 60% of all available rebounds and a preposterous 40% of their own misses.
“That was really the difference in the game,” Warriors coach Steve Kerr said.
Boston’s second-chance scoring offset Golden State’s 18-4 edge in fast-break points, a predictable bellwether for a Finals between two turnover-prone teams. Because turnovers lead to run-outs, run-outs lead to runs, and no team feeds faster on runs quite like the Warriors.
Unless Williams is there to clean up his teammates’ mess or create one for Golden State.
“He’s a game-changer,” Horford added. “We’re very fortunate to have a guy like that who impacts winning in the way that he does. It’s beyond the numbers.”
Udoka claimed he didn't know Williams' availability Wednesday until pregame warmups. He had stretched and biked and iced the knee. Sometimes that's enough, others it's not. Williams enjoyed two full days off before Game 2, then barely played in a blowout loss, when Golden State owned the interior in his absence.
On Wednesday, Williams felt good. So he played 25 minutes and 56 seconds, enough time for Boston to bully the Warriors off the floor with bigger lineups featuring Williams and Horford. Williams played long enough through pain, the same that has been dogging him all postseason, for the Celtics to inflict their own.
"Just trying to be accountable for my team. We made it this far," Williams said. "Obviously I had a discussion with myself, by pushing through this. I'm happy with how it's going. We'll worry about the injury after the season, but for now I'm still fighting."
He's also welcomed help from his teammates. Smart, who's recently overcome ankle, foot and quad ailments, has regularly been in Williams' ear this postseason.
"We've got a chance to do something special. There's no guarantees that we'll be back here. If you can go, we'll take 20 percent of you better than none of you," Smart said he told Williams. "He understood that, and he decided to go out there and put his big boy pants on and suck it up and go crazy."
And now the Celtics are two games from a championship, a remarkable place thanks to their young center with a rare reach and a will to match.
