Jayson Tatum has shined as the primary defender against Kevin Durant during the first three games.
Though only Game 1 went down to the wire, all three games in the first-round series between the Boston Celtics and Brooklyn Nets have been within five points in the last five minutes. The Celtics had the league’s second-worst clutch record (13-22) in the regular season, but are now 3-0 in the playoffs, having held Brooklyn to just seven points on 11 clutch possessions.
The Nets have a point differential of minus-4.7 points per game, better than that of the 2-2 Minnesota Timberwolves and four teams currently down 3-1. But every other team has won at least one game, while the Nets are in serious danger of being swept, facing elimination in Game 4 on Monday (7 ET, TNT).
Ben Simmons will not play, perhaps delaying his Nets debut another six months. Despite that and the inevitability of a 3-0 series, there are a few intriguing things to keep an eye on in Game 4.
1. The continued ascension of Jayson Tatum
Tatum has been the primary defender on Kevin Durant, helping hold one of the greatest offensive players in NBA history to just 22 points per game on 37% shooting over the first three games. It’s certainly been a team effort, but Tatum has had some incredible moments defensively …
And while Tatum is doing all that on defense, he’s averaging 29.7 points and 8.0 assists on the other end of the floor. He hasn’t been the most efficient high volume scorer in these playoffs – his true shooting percentage of 58.4% ranks 10th among 11 players who’ve averaged at least 25 – but he’s been making the shots that Durant hasn’t …
And his passing just continues to get better …
Jayson Tatum is a two-way star, we’re witnessing something special in this series, and this could be just the beginning of a long and spectacular postseason for the 24-year-old.
2. Getting Durant going
Even if coming back from an 0-3 deficit seems like an impossible task, Durant probably doesn’t want to go out with another sub-par offensive performance. Nothing will come easy against this Boston defense, but Durant can certainly play much better than he has.
And he’s partly responsible for his own problems. He made it clear after Game 3 that he’s been “thinking too much” about how to attack the Celtics’ defense. He’s been in his own head and he’s made some confounding blunders, with turnovers being a bigger issue than missed shots. Even with how well the Celtics have defended him, if Durant had just made a few better decisions and a couple of more open shots, this could be a very different series.
The Nets did get Durant a clean catch-and-shoot 3 early in Game 3, when Jaylen Brown shaded toward a Kyrie Irving iso against Al Horford and a Bruce Brown dive cut got Tatum detached from his assignment …
But the Nets really didn’t go back to that same look (Irving iso’d against Horford), Irving generally hasn’t been that quick to get off the ball, and Boston hasn’t generally showed that much help on the perimeter against anybody other than Durant. Game 3 did come with much more ball movement (333 passes per 24 minutes of possessions) than the Nets had in Games 1 and 2 (283 per 24), but they obviously aren’t the Warriors when it comes to moving the ball and bodies. In fact, the Nets were one of two teams (Dallas was the other) that ranked in the bottom six in both ball and player movement in the regular season.
3. More Timelord
While Simmons continues to wear (interesting) street clothes, Robert Williams III made his return from a seven-game, four-week absence on Saturday. The Celtics might not need Williams much in this series, but he will certainly be critical going forward. And he looked pretty good in his 15:34 off the bench in Game 3.
Williams looked bouncy enough as the Celtics ran an ATO (via a Tatum back-screen) for him on their first possession of the second quarter, only to be thwarted by a Goran Dragic foul …
And on the ensuing Brooklyn possession, Williams scrammed Payton Pritchard out of a mismatch with Andre Drummond and then stuffed Drummond’s attempt to get around him …
The Nets scored just 26 points on 27 possessions with Williams on the floor on Saturday (they scored 77 on 64 otherwise) and the Celtics’ when-healthy starting lineup allowed just 94.2 per 100 (easily the best mark among high-usage lineups) in 443 total minutes in the regular season. That starting group wasn’t reunited in Game 3, but it should be soon enough.
4. Brooklyn bigs or small ball
Speaking of starting lineups … A year ago, Drummond started 26 straight games with the Lakers until he was DNP’d in the final game of their first-round series loss to the Phoenix Suns. And it wouldn’t be a shock if history repeated itself on Monday.
Drummond has started all 28 games he’s played for the Nets, but his minutes have not been good in this series. Brooklyn has been outscored by 19.5 points per 100 possessions in Drummond’s 56 minutes, with bad numbers on both ends of the floor. And Brooklyn has outscored Boston with Drummond off the floor in two of the three games. (The context, of course, is that Drummond is mostly playing against the Celtics’ starters.)
Drummond is usually a force on the glass, but has just three offensive rebounds in those 56 minutes (1.9 per 36), down from 6.3 per 36 in the regular season. And if he’s not giving the Nets a bunch of second chances, his value is diminished greatly.
Nic Claxton (13-for-16 in the restricted area) gives the Nets more of a vertical threat on offense and more mobility on defense. He’s allowed 16 points on eight isolation possessions defensively, but by the eye test (see the Tatum step-back jumper gif’d above), his iso defense hasn’t been bad.
The Nets dusted off Blake Griffin in Game 3, and he hit two threes while giving them two good possessions of defense. But the Celtics kept going after him and ultimately scored 21 points on 14 possessions with him on the floor. LaMarcus Aldridge, who’s played in just two of the last 21 games, is the Nets’ last option at the five. He was the best mid-range shooter in the league this season (55.8%), so he’d give them the ability to space the floor better around Durant, but he’s probably the least-mobile defender in this series.
Small ball is another option. The Nets have scored 21 points on 12 offensive possessions (175 per 100) with Durant on the floor without Drummond, Claxton or Griffin. In that configuration, Bruce Brown (who’s 6-for-12 from 3-point range in the series) has been their worst shooter in the lineup (though there have been two possessions where it’s been Durant and four small guards – no Brown).
Most of that success (16 points on eight possessions, including three straight 3s) came after the Celtics had Game 3 in hand (up 13 with 3:51 left), and lineups with three of the Nets’ small guards on the floor at once would obviously struggle defensively. But maximizing the 3-point shooting around Durant may just be the best of several not-so-great options, the Nets would at least be more mobile defensively than they would be with one of the non-Claxton bigs on the floor, and Durant himself isn’t the worst rim protector.
Whether they play small or not, the Nets should want to see what would happen if they just committed a few fewer turnovers and if Durant hit a few more shots. The question is if they really want to see TD Garden again before next season.
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John Schuhmann is a senior stats analyst for NBA.com. You can e-mail him here, find his archive here and follow him on Twitter.
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