Rapid Recap is designed for the busiest of Celtics fans. Whether you can’t stay awake to read 10 paragraphs or your hangover is just too much, Rapid Recap tells the timeline of the game in only a minute or two.
With no Kemba Walker or Jaylen Brown for tonight’s game, it wasn’t going to be easy for the Boston Celtics, even against a Phoenix Suns team that’s come waaaaaay back to earth after a hot start. Another offensive crapfest early on meant the Cs had to keep trying to make comebacks that they weren’t equipped to complete sans Walker and Brown. In fairness, no one expects career 29% shooter Mikal Bridges to drop 26 on you, but Devin Booker (39-10-9) and Deandre Ayton (26-15-2) also ran wild to the tune of a 123-119 final score.
Marcus Smart did that thing where he tries to keep the Celtics alive single-handedly, and it almost worked: He canned 11 triples out of 22 attempts to break the franchise record, and went 13-25 overall for 37 points, 5 rebounds, 8 assists and 4 steals. Jayson Tatum also went for it on both ends of the floor (26-10-2-3-1), and Gordon Hayward racked up 22 despite poor shooting and weird hesitance.
It began in expected fashion with offensive struggles. They were getting wide-open looks due to the weakness of the Suns’ defense, and absolutely nothing was going in.
Sans Kemba, the Celtics continue to be Bevis-like with their inability to score
— Handsome B. Wonderful (@JamPackard) January 19, 2020
The Celtics offense has been ROUGH without Kemba Walker this season. Without him and Jaylen Brown tonight, the Cs start 1 for 8 from the field.
— Jay King (@ByJayKing) January 19, 2020
Much better energy from the Celtics tonight and yet it's another slow start.
— Mike Dynon ☘️🏀 (@MikeDynon) January 19, 2020
The Suns have strong offense, as one would expect from a squad with Devin Booker on it, and they jumped out to a quick lead. (Though it’s worth noting Boston did well defending around the rim. If they hadn’t, the lead would’ve been far greater.)
Things improved toward the end as the shots started falling and the Celtics were able to bully the Suns more effectively:
Tatum gets two to end the 1st quarter
𝐂𝐞𝐥𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐬 𝐑𝐞𝐰𝐢𝐧𝐝 (📲 @MetroByTMobile ) pic.twitter.com/uA9jcBvp39— Celtics on NBC Sports Boston (@NBCSCeltics) January 19, 2020
Early Returns: The #Celtics finish the 1Q with 10-0 run, trail 26-20. Keys thus far
✅ Devin Booker (Has 11 pts)
✅Marcus Smart (9 pts, all on 3's)
✅ C's 3-point defense (Suns just 1/6 on 3s)— A. Sherrod Blakely (@ASherrodblakely) January 19, 2020
The Suns went 5 minutes, 53 seconds without a point.
— Adam Himmelsbach (@AdamHimmelsbach) January 19, 2020
Phoenix managed to stay just a touch ahead of Boston throughout much of the next frame. The Cs reached deep in the bench and managed to find some gold. Well, mostly gold:
just don't have him guard devin booker
— Jared Weiss (@JaredWeissNBA) January 19, 2020
And Tatum, coming off an uneven game against Milwaukee, had yet another Dope Moment:
https://twitter.com/maxacarlin/status/1218699027535073280?s=20
But still in a lot of ways the first half could be characterized thusly:
A supercut of Tommy providing accurate game commentary exclusively with heavy sighs
— Tim (@only1big3) January 19, 2020
Smart: 4-of-8 from 3-point range
Rest of Celtics: 1-of-11 from 3-point range.— Brian Robb (@BrianTRobb) January 19, 2020
There are bad stretches in a season and then there are embarrassing stretches and the C’s are at risk of going from one to the other pretty soon
— Ryan Bernardoni (@dangercart) January 19, 2020
Marcus Smart kept the Celtics alive singlehandedly with six triples, and they were lucky to be down just 9 at the half (60-51 Suns).
In the third, the tandem scoring threat of Booker and Ayton threatened to overwhelm again. But the Cs stayed very much in the mix, in no small part because of Tatum’s energy on defense and the high-flying Daniel Theis:
It's Daniel Theis alley-oop szn
— Jay King (@ByJayKing) January 19, 2020
T H E 🔨S
𝐂𝐞𝐥𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐬 𝐑𝐞𝐰𝐢𝐧𝐝 (📲 @MetroByTMobile ) pic.twitter.com/NxrHJzSzQY— Celtics on NBC Sports Boston (@NBCSCeltics) January 19, 2020
9-2 Celtics run.
— Brian Robb (@BrianTRobb) January 19, 2020
But the real story was Smart, of course.
Career-high with 12 attempts. https://t.co/OoOplptoFF
— Abby Chin (@tvabby) January 19, 2020
B O O M pic.twitter.com/0I0YvY0YON
— Boston Celtics (@celtics) January 19, 2020
It just…wasn’t…enough. In these recent losses, it sometimes seems like nothing is, and unsurprisingly it was 87-76 Suns with 12 minutes to go.
Again, it feels like they have a different combo of their top 5 out every night. That was bound to take it’s toll at some point. https://t.co/kaHghI0J8h
— Nate Jones (@JonesOnTheNBA) January 19, 2020
The fourth began like more of the same, though you could tell the Suns were beginning to get a little bit cocky—and then the Celtics really caught them slipping on a series of lazy possessions and shrunk the deficit:
https://twitter.com/maxacarlin/status/1218713179699716096?s=20
The #Celtics FINALLY give the fans some hope of a potential comeback tonight vs the #Suns, currently on a 9-3 run to start the 4Q, trail 90-85 with 9:12 to play.
— A. Sherrod Blakely (@ASherrodblakely) January 19, 2020
Celtics not named Smart (or Javonte Green, 1-1) had been 0 for 13 on threes before that deep and big one by Hayward.
— Adam Himmelsbach (@AdamHimmelsbach) January 19, 2020
I should stress that Hayward’s triple was, like, from typical Curry distance, for what that’s worth. Unfortunately it wasn’t worth a lot, as Dario Saric and sophomore Mikal Bridges immediately answered with treys of their own. Nothing’s easy. Back to a double-digit Suns lead.
Sure, there was SMARF:
Marcus Smart's eighth 3-pointer tonight represents a new career high (7, March 18, 2015 at OKC)
— Celtics Stats (@celtics_stats) January 19, 2020
Smart steals the ball and gets it to Tatum for three
𝐂𝐞𝐥𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐬 𝐑𝐞𝐰𝐢𝐧𝐝 (📲 @MetroByTMobile ) pic.twitter.com/6w8bJ4iMuJ— Celtics on NBC Sports Boston (@NBCSCeltics) January 19, 2020
Things would ultimately come down to the wire in the most nail-biting fashion. While Smart blew apart the Celtics record for triples in a game and almost completed the comeback on his own, there were too many other blown opportunities—Hayward’s missed layup out of a perfect ATO, fouling the wrong Suns in the final seconds, a massive deficit in rebounds—for this to be anything but the loss it was.
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