At least for one night, the critics of Evan Turner can insert foot in mouth. ET played outstanding during Boston’s win against Philadelphia last night in their first preseason game.
Turner finished with 15 points, 10 rebounds, and 6 assists over 31 minutes in the 98-78 Celtic win. He also finished a team best plus-19 in plus/minus.
Maybe the most impressive thing Turner showed was his heart and energy, all night he harassed his man on the defensive end and played his rotations extremely well. On offense, whenever he was given the chance to run the show the Celtics were at there best.
He did a great job not forcing the offense and really just played with terrific rhythm. He looked extremely calm for someone playing point guard for the first time since college.
As John mentioned this morning, Brad Stevens had a calming effect on Turner, Brad Stevens added that this could be just the beginning.
“That’s who he’s got to be. I think he can be better than he was tonight, but he played well,” Stevens said. “He’s been pretty good in practice. He was not as good in the scrimmage the other night and I think he was pretty hard on himself, but I thought Sunday was his best practice and he followed it up with a very good game tonight.”
After last night, and I may be overreacting a little bit, I am extremely excited to see the year Evan Turner could have. He looks like he will be a huge contributor to this team this year.
He outplayed Marcus Smart at point guard, and probably will start on opening night if he keeps it up all preseason. Expect for Turner to get a lot more looks from Brad Stevens at point guard, as the coach tries to see if he will be the best replacement for the injured Rajon Rondo.
Check out Evan Turner’s highlights from his Celtics debut last night below. Once again, a really outstanding performance from him and he proved the doubters wrong on night one.
Add The Sports Daily to your Google News Feed!
