Tonight the Celtics will be in Philadelphia to take on the 76ers for the fourth and final time this season. They’ll also be looking for their fourth win over Philly, who seem to not be able to beat them no matter what the circumstances are.
The 76ers clinched a playoff spot after beating the Hornets last night 118-114. They’re currently sitting in third place with a record of 46-25. They’ve been playing good basketball as of late, winning their last 5 games. They’ve won 7 of their last 10. Their recent play is just another reason why their fans are feeling extra confident about tonight’s match up. Philly has a 28-9 home record, and the Celtics have a pretty mediocre road record of 17-17. This should be one that they are favored to win, especially riding a 5 game win streak into the game.
The Celtics have been up and down lately. Since going out West, they’ve been better, but still aren’t completely consistent. Monday’s game was a prime example of that as the Celtics lost because of pure stupidity. Their poor shot selection and execution was what did them in against the Nuggets.
Gordon Hayward will be out again tonight as he is in the NBA concussion protocol.
The Pacers dropped their third straight game last night, which means that the C’s are just a half game back of the fourth seed. A win tonight in Philly would see them overtake Indy, and draw them within two of the 76ers. Home court is going to important in the playoffs. It would be nice if the Celtics finally did something to get themselves that advantage. It seems like every time they have the chance to move up, they lose the game and remain in fifth.
Recent history tells us that the C’s should be able to get the win in Philly. They’ve beaten the Sixers 20 of the last 23 times that they’ve met each other.
This game tonight may be the epitome of “The Celtics show up in big games.” It’s something that we saw the last time that they visited Philadelphia. They were really struggling going in, dropping back to back games to the Lakers and Clippers. The expectations were pretty low after they just blew a 28 point lead at home. On the other side, the 76ers had won their last 2 games after acquiring Tobias Harris at the trade deadline. Oh, and the Celtics didn’t have Kyrie that night. They still managed to go into to the Wells Fargo Center and beat the Sixers on their home floor.
I don’t know why they shouldn’t do the same tonight. Sure, Monday’s loss was pretty rough, but they still own the Sixers. I think it’s become psychological at this point, but Philly is a favorable match up for the C’s. Simmons still can’t shoot to save his life, Horford and Baynes both own Embiid, and the others haven’t proven that they can play against the Celtics yet.
Should the Celtics win tonight, it would serve as a nice confidence booster for them. Beating a team like Philadelphia on the road may be easy for them, but not for everyone else. So it’s still something to be proud of.
If Boston plans on continuing their dominance over the 76ers, they’ll have to step up their defense tonight. Over the last 4 games, they’re allowing about 107 ppg. That could use some work. In the two games that they lost, it was mostly because of their defense. There’s no way that they’re going to beat the Clippers when they’re giving up 140 points. Monday night, they couldn’t get a stop to save their lives.
Everyone in the entire starting lineup for Philadelphia can hurt them, except for Simmons because he sucks. Redick, Harris, Butler, and Embiid can all put up a bunch of points. Redick is probably the one that scares me most. The majority of his shots are threes, and he seems to always play pretty well against the Celtics. Redick is also having quite the week, not scoring less than 17 in any of his last 4 games. It’s probably going to be Kyrie chasing him around tonight, so he’s going to have to bring it defensively.
The starting lineup for Philly may be kind of stacked, but their bench is far from that. They’ve seen some nice games from a few guys, but it’s been nothing consistent. This is where the Celtics are going to have to exploit them. Boston’s bench is much deeper than theirs is, and they’re going to have to show it.
One guy I’m really banking on is Jaylen Brown. Before last game, he’d been on fire lately. In the three games prior, he was averaging around 22 ppg on like 60% shooting. He had a rough night against the Nuggets, scoring just 6 points, but I’m confident that he’ll bring it tonight. Brown has been someone that’s been there in big games when the Celtics need him. For example, he’s had good games in both of the games against Golden State. Unfortunately, he hasn’t had that kind of success against Philadelphia. Hopefully he’ll turn that around tonight.
Terry Rozier also needs to have a big game. Kyrie is likely going to be a little more tired than usual because he’ll be chasing JJ Redick around all night. The Celtics are going to need him to be productive when Kyrie is getting some much needed rest. Rozier was also talking a bit of trash on Twitter this week. A Sixers fan was telling him they were going to beat the C’s, and this was his reply.
Needless to say, he has some backing up to do tonight.
One last thing I want to mention before I wrap this up, the Celtics are going to have to weather the storm tonight. I’d imagine that the 76ers are going to come out strong and throw a heavy punch early on. The C’s are going to have to respond with a “punch” of their own. They can’t just get beat from the get go, this game has to be at least a respectable loss should it end that way.
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