BOSTON — By the time the Celtics put the finishing touches on their blowout win over the Jazz, there was little denying this team. The 17-0 mark at home immediately pops out in the standings as the C’s matched a franchise record with their 17th straight home victory to start the season.
But beyond the standings, the Celtics matched another franchise record. After their 126-97 win over the Jazz on Friday, it marked the ninth straight game where the C’s have scored at least 120 points. That matches a franchise-best streak with the 1960 Celtics team.
“It’s just the talent, honestly,” Kristaps Porzingis said of the offense. “Us settling in a little bit into our roles and our way of playing and we’re just that talented to be honest. Tonight, they’re doubling (Jayson Tatum), JT’s going to make the right pass and the right play and that’s an automatic huge advantage for us. … With these kind of talented players playing just makes all these things so much easier.”
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The offense has been on a different level in recent weeks as the points have come easy even with revolving personnel and availability. Over that nine-game stretch, the Celtics have the league’s best offensive rating at 127.7. They’ve averaged a startling 130.2 points per game.
There are plenty of factors that go into the offense, though it starts with the Celtics making shots. But other factors include the team’s giveaways going way down as they’re turning it over just 11.1% of the time. They’re also crashing the boards, giving them second-chance opportunities.
Interestingly, the C’s aren’t necessarily shooting the lights out of the ball — much like the start of last season. Over those nine games, they’ve hit 37.6% of their 3-pointers, which isn’t a bad number but there are teams shooting better during that stretch. But the C’s are taking 95 field goals per game, which has been powered by their lack of turnovers and offensive rebounding.
The Celtics will need plenty of those makes as they take on the Pacers over their next two games with both of those coming in Indiana. Pacers guard Tyrese Haliburton has broken out, leading the league’s best offense over the course of the season. So the Celtics will need to slow down the Pacers while scoring in bunches as C’s coach Joe Mazzulla has stressed both sides of the ball are connected.
“Your defense starts with your offense because you take great shots and you’re well-spaced,” Mazzulla said. “And your offense starts with your defense and you get stops and protect the rim and force the right guys to shoot contested shots and you can get out and run. So I think we’ve grown really this year at seeing the connectivity between how the game’s played. Everything is a product of something else. So we just have to continue to understand that and fight to keep those habits on both ends.”
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