Jaylen Brown didn’t play in the fourth quarter or overtime during the Boston Celtics’ 119-117 win over the New York Knicks at Madison Square Garden on Tuesday night. Brown, who has acknowledged a minutes limit, had played up to 29 minutes in several games earlier that week. After the game, head coach Joe Mazzulla avoided directly addressing Brown’s minutes limit when asked about it.
“We just got what we needed to get out of him as he continues to push himself and test himself,” said the Celtics head coach in his post-game interview. “We still got games left so we got what we needed to get, what we needed to see and we’ll just continue to move forward.”
Brown, the All-Star wing is dealing with a bone bruise in his knee and logged a season-low 22 minutes for the second consecutive game. Brown struggled during his time on the court, finishing with six points and five rebounds on 2-of-8 shooting. He also committed three turnovers.
Brown has downplayed any concern about hitting 65 games to qualify for a potential postseason award, insisting it’s not influencing his decision to play in games that hold little significance as it pertains to the standings. However, to make his appearance count toward his season total, he had to play at least 20 minutes. With just three games left in the season, Brown needs to appear in two of them to reach the 65-game threshold.
The Celtics in the brink of history
With Brown sidelined for most of the fourth quarter and overtime, Mazzulla leaned on Sam Hauser, Payton Pritchard, and Luke Kornet during crunch time as Boston mounted a late rally for the overtime win. After the game, the veteran wing was seen with a wrap on his knee in the locker room and opted not to speak with reporters.
For the first time since the 2019-20 season, the Celtics swept the season series against the New York Knicks. But the fourth game wasn’t as easy as the previous three. In those earlier matchups, the Celtics trailed the Knicks for only 50 seconds, winning by 23, 27, and 13 points. Tuesday night, however, New York made Boston fight for every possession, pushing them to overtime before the Celtics pulled out the win.
Despite the close game, the Celtics clinched another victory, bringing them one win away from their second consecutive 60-win season. If they reach that milestone, it will mark their first back-to-back 60-win seasons since 2007-08 and 2008-09, 15 years ago.
Before that, only two other stretches saw similar success: Larry Bird guided the Celtics to three straight 60-win seasons from 1979-82 and again from 1983-86. In total, 14 Celtics teams have achieved 60 wins, with seven of them securing NBA Finals titles.
With 17 wins in their last 18 road games, the Celtics have proven themselves exceptional away from TD Garden. They boast the second-best road scoring differential in NBA history, outscoring opponents by 10.15 points per game. The only team with a better road differential is the 1972 Lakers, who finished the season with an 11.32-point margin on their way to an NBA championship.
The post Joe Mazzulla reveals reason behind Jaylen Brown benching vs. Knicks appeared first on ClutchPoints.
0 Mga Komento