NEW YORK – The Boston Celtics are red hot this season, and are sitting comfortably atop of the National Basketball Association’s (NBA) Eastern Conference standings with the league’s best record.
But complacency has not set in, with the team insisting that they had not forgotten about bad results, specifically when they suffered their worst loss of the campaign, 113-93 to the Los Angeles Clippers earlier in December.
On Thursday night, the Celtics made sure that chastening defeat did not happen again as they beat the Clippers 116-110 in Boston, thanks to 29 points apiece from their star players Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum.
“We definitely wanted to play better than we played last time,” Brown said on ESPN, referring to that loss on Dec 12 in which Boston were held to under 100 points for the first time in 2022.
“Those guys beat us up pretty bad in LA. So we wanted to change the narrative tonight on our home floor and come out and get a win.”
The Celtics improved to 26-10 and are leading the Brooklyn Nets (23-12), who are on a 10-game winning streak, in the East.
“None of us enjoyed what happened in LA,” said assistant coach Damon Stoudamire, taking the place of interim coach Joe Mazzulla while he recovers from a corneal abrasion.
“We’re all very prideful. So I knew they were going to come back and have an edge to them.”
Brown scored 12 in the fourth quarter to help the Celtics close out their fourth straight win, while Tatum grabbed 11 rebounds for his 14th double-double of the season.
Marcus Smart had 17 points, nine assists and two steals, while Derrick White added 15 points and Robert Williams III 12 for Boston.
Kawhi Leonard led Los Angeles (21-16) with 26 points to go with eight rebounds, and Paul George had 24 points and six assists for the Clippers, who had five players score in double figures.
Twice in the game, Brown pulled the Celtics clear of the Clippers with runs of seven straight points.
With Boston just three up with 33 seconds remaining, White produced a superb block to deny George’s lay-up and the Celtics kept a firm grip on the game from that point.
“We bounced back well and now we have got four tough games on the road and we have to find a way to get wins,” said White, reflecting on closing out their seven-game homestand and the New Year’s Day trip to the Denver Nuggets (22-12), who are second in the West.
Elsewhere, Ja Morant provided a career-high 17 assists as the Memphis Grizzlies beat the Toronto Raptors 119-106 with Dillon Brooks helping himself to 25 points.
The Raptors have now lost five straight home games and eight of their last 10 games despite Pascal Siakam’s strong form – he has now scored 25 or more in the last six games.
The New York Knicks suffered a fifth straight loss with a 122-115 defeat by the San Antonio Spurs with Keldon Johnson scoring 30 points.
Julian Randle had a season-high 41 points but could not stop the Knicks’ slide.
Separately, the NBA has suspended Detroit Pistons guard Killian Hayes for three games and Orlando Magic centre Moritz Wagner for two games, with nine other players handed one-match suspensions following a mass scuffle during their game on Wednesday.
Pistons guard Hamidou Diallo was given a one-game ban and eight Magic players will also serve suspensions of that duration.
Guards Cole Anthony, R.J. Hampton, Gary Harris and Kevon Harris; forwards Admiral Schofield and Franz Wagner; and centres Mo Bamba and Wendell Carter Jr have each been suspended for one game.
Wagner, Hayes and Diallo were all ejected after a shoving match that had both benches fired up in the second quarter of the Pistons’ 121-101 victory over the Magic.
The Pistons were up by nine when the incident was sparked by Wagner, who shoved Hayes off the court as he chased a loose ball down the sideline. Diallo raced in and pushed Wagner from behind, then Hayes hit Wagner in the back of the head, sending him sprawling into the Pistons bench. REUTERS, AFP
