The Celtics kickstarted their NBA season with back-to-back wins with a first home win of the season as they beat the Miami Heat 119-111 on Friday night. Every Celtics starter surpassed 15 points, Derrick White led by example with a brilliant 28 points, 6 rebounds, 3 assists and 3 blocks to spur the Celtics to the win. This win takes the Celtics to a 2-0 to start the season after defeating the reigning Eastern Conference campions.
Boston seemingly replaced last years lob-to-Rob opening play perfectly, as Jrue Holiday laced a corner 3-pointer to add the Cs first points of the game, before Miami jumped out to a quick 26-13 lead through 9 first quarter points from Heat guard Tyler Herro. The Celtics soon fought back late in the first, with Oshae Brissett providing 3 big offensive boards and a thunderous dunk leaving the score 28-25. Bam Adebayo took a liking to his match up with Kristaps Porzingis picking up 15 first half points, as the Heat supporting cast started to get hot from three shooting 48.5% from three in the game. However, Jayson Tatum’s 11 second quarter points drove the Celtics into a lead - despite Tatum having a quiet game by his high standards finishing with 22 points 8 rebounds and 5 assists - as Boston headed into the break with a five-point lead.
The second half began with both sides trading buckets as Duncan Robinson, Kyle Lowry and Tyler Herro all hit in multiple 3s for the Heat, which was swiftly cancelled out by Jaylen Brown finally finding some offensive rhythm as he finished the game with 27 points and 6 rebounds on 50% shooting from the field.
The Boston bench once again offered little offensive production as they were outscored 20-8 by the Heat’s bench unit. Although Boston appeared to have found a way to improve their rebounding issues against the Knicks as they were able to win the battle on the glass 55-45 (5 more offensive rebounds than their opponents) resulting in 23 second chance points according to NBA Stats. Holiday and Horford led the way on the boards both collecting 10 rebounds each. Despite this, the Heat were still able to take a small 88-87 lead heading into the final quarter.
This was where Derrick White truly took over the game as he poured in 9 points in the first 3 minutes of the fourth quarter taking Boston out to a 96-90 lead. The moment of the game undoubtedly was White’s incredible chase down rejection of Jimmy Butler’s dunk as he ran full court to deny him what looked like the simplest of 2 points.
Nevertheless, the Heat battled to keep it close as they trailed by just 7 with 3:18 to go in the game, when Jimmy Butler drew a foul from Porzingis which was his 6th resulting in the Celtics being forced to bring in Al Horford for the final exchanges of the game. It looked as if the Heat may have found a way back into the game when Kevin Love and Tyler Herro both added 3-pointers to cut the lead to just 3 with 47 seconds left on the clock. Luckily for Boston, White was there yet again to hit two clutch free throws, before Jaylen Brown coolly buried an open three to polish off the game for the Celtics coming out 119-111 winners on a successful return to the TD Garden.
Derrick White had this to say after his monster performance: “It could be someone different every night, one through 15. Oshae [Brissett] came in and changed the game for us. We've got a lot of guys, a lot of weapons, and it's going to be a fun year”. Joe Mazzulla had this to say about Derrick Whites superb performance :“The plays he made tonight were sick. They were just sick plays, it’s the only way you can describe it”. The Celtics will have the weekend off before travelling to Washington to match up with the new-look Wizards on Monday night at the Capital One Arena.
By Will C
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