Stick with it /GBPVJ3ltP5- Boston Celtics January 20, 2023 Aided along by an increasingly dysfunctional Boston offense, the Warriors entered the final quarter with a seven-point edge, 89-82. Led by their starting lineup (the bench scored just 10 points), the Warriors steadily pushed their lead forward, leading by as many as 11 points as the quarter carried on. The starting lineup continued to produce, while Tatum’s and Brown’s struggles saw no signs of easing. The second half brought a quick shift in the Warriors’ favor. Horford scored 20 points and blocked three shots, Williams III posted a 14-11-2 statline, and the duo grabbed a combined 10 offensive rebounds on the night. Horford and Williams III both produced at a high level for much of the night, with the former doing some increasingly rare work in the paint and the latter crashing the offensive glass and piling up second-chance points. With the Warriors downsizing their starting lineup, benching Kevon Looney in favor of Poole, the Celtics enjoyed a size advantage this evening and worked to exploit it. Rob lobs are the best lobs /8Y3FD5woYi- Boston Celtics January 20, 2023 The Golden State threes won the quarter, narrowly, and the Celtics trailed entering the second, 26-25. They essentially shot the inverse of one another, with the Celtics forcing the issue in the paint but bricking their jumpers, while the Warriors scored their first 12 points from behind the three-point arc until Poole slammed home a dunk with just over six minutes to play in the quarter. Neither team looked particularly coordinated on that end of the floor in the opening quarter, as both opened the game shooting worse than 40% from the field. The re-rematch began with a strange offensive tenor. The Warriors were led by their customary trio of Steph Curry, Klay Thompson and Jordan Poole, who combined to score 77 points on the evening, but couldn’t keep the Celtics at bay down the stretch. Jaylen Brown, meanwhile, struggled in his return from an adductor strain, scoring just 16 points on 6-of-18 shooting, but connected on the game-tying three-pointer to send the game to overtime. Jayson Tatum stuffed the stat sheet, recording 34 points, 19 rebounds, 6 assists and 3 steals, but he once again struggled to score efficiently against the Golden State defense, shooting 9-of-27 from the field. The boogeyman came to town, and the Celtics finally vanquished them, flipping the script on a game that initially looked far too familiar to score a remarkable 121-118 win in overtime. This evening, the Celtics got another chance. Presented with the opportunity for some small measure of revenge for their postseason fate, the Celtics suffered a blowout loss on the road against the Warriors in early December - a deflating loss that derailed some of their early-season momentum, sparking a run of five losses in six games for Boston. In the wake of their six-game loss in the NBA Finals, the Boston Celtics have developed something of a boogeyman in the Golden State Warriors.
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