Can anybody actually stop the Boston Celtics?

Can anybody actually stop the Boston Celtics?

The Boston Celtics have the best record in the NBA this season their starting lineup has been one of the most Unstoppable fiveman groups we’ve seen in the last 20 years and they’re getting contributions from up and down the roster we know that this team is good

Enough to rack up wins in the regular season but just how far does it look like this team can go in the playoffs I want to take a look at what makes the Boston Celtics seem so Unstoppable this season and what their weaknesses are if any as we head into the playoffs since

The allstar break the Celtics have the number one offense the number nine defense and by far the number one net rating in the league they have a ton of variety to their offense but one thing that they do that’s different from a lot of other teams is that when something is

Working they’re going to run it into the ground until you start to adjust but they add another layer to it because even when you do make that adjustment they’re just going to move on to the next thing let’s look at this set from early in their recent matchup against

The Pelicans the set starts with Tatum looking like he’s going to get a pin down from porzingis but Tatum is actually going to be trying to move herb Jones in front of valent chunis so that porzingis can pop out to the perimeter for an open three on the next possession they’re

Going to do the same thing but this time herb shows on the pass to porzingis to allow valent chunis time to recover the problem though is that now valent chunis is pulled away from the paint so when t tum gets the post entry pass there’s not

Going to be a help Defender available to disrupt Tatum’s shot at The Rim when he attacks the basket another thing that the Celtics do to throw off opposing defenses is incorporating inverted pick and rolls Drew is going to pitch it to Tatum and then roll to the basket and with herb

Closing out a little bit too aggressively on Tatum’s pump fake it keeps Zion pulled towards the nail instead of trailing Drew to the paint and it allows Tatum to throw it over over the top to Drew for the Finish when Personnel changes in some of the bench

Guys come in they can go to this empty side pick and roll with Horford rolling as one option for brown to feed it to but they’ll incorporate this pin down screen as well and with Horford’s role keeping Larry Nance junor closer to the paint there’s not going to be a closeout

Available to contest white for the three they’ll run the same play again the following possession but this time you can see Nance anticipating the pin down so he’s focused on being available for the Clos out if he needs to but with the weak side Defenders focused on guarding

The pin down action it’s going to leave the pass to Horford in the paint open and he’s able to put it in another thing that the Celtics do incredibly well is get opposing defenses to overh help but more importantly most of the guys on their roster are able to capitalize on

The advantage that’s created when defenses send two on the ball let’s look at this play for example porzingis and white get into the dribble handoff the white is going to reject it and drive Baseline bringing McCullum with him along with herb Jones as a result white has two Defenders leaving porzingis open

With everybody else marking guys on the weak side of the floor herb Jones is actually going to make a pretty good rotation back on a porzingis but the problem is Murphy is rotating as well so when porzingis Drives By him herb is going to be looking to rotate onto Drew

In the corner forcing Marshall to step up onto porzingis on the drive and it leaves Jaylen Brown open for the dump off when he draws McCullum into help they have guys up and down the roster that know how to move off ball to continue to develop advantages and turn

Them into high percentage looks on this play White and Tatum are going to be getting into this empty corner pick and roll and white feeds it over the top to Tatum prompting the defense to collapse onto him cornette knows that he needs to keep vo away from the corner so he’s

Going to cut towards the paint as well and this is going to leave Horford open in the corner and Tatum finds him for three white and Tatum are going to get into the pick and roll and Maxi stays with white even though Covington switches leaving Tatum open for the pass

And it prompts the Anthony Melton to fill in what’s important to note now is that embiid is left guarding two players on the strong side corner so Hower is going to make this cut to the paint forcing embiid to stay in the paint because if he doesn’t then Tatum just

Feeds Hower for an easy two points but it ends up leaving Al Horford wide open in the corner for the catch and shoot three even just the simple threat of Tatum creating an isolation from the perimeter can be enough for teams to send help and with the Celtics typically

Having quick triggers surrounding him at all times it makes it incredibly difficult for defenses to recover after helping off of a shooter in time to disrupt the shot and the frequency at which the Celtics are able to get teams to help off of Shooters is really high

And it’s due to a couple of things a lot of teams will hedge against Tatum in the pick and roll or trap him in IR because of how good of a pull-up three-point shooter he’s been and that’s usually going to leave whoever the rle man is

Open for a pass in the short roll specifically though when it’s porzingis teams are always going to send that tag because they know porzingis is able to do a ton of damage as a rle man so once that help gets triggered the Celtics can create easy threes out of it now let’s

Expand on all of this a little bit having high percentage three-point Shooters is one thing but there’s another layer to all of this that can really make a team even more difficult to guard not only is it important to have guys that can knock down threes at

An efficient rate off the catch but arguably just as important is the speed at which the ball is being released how can you minimize the time between catching the ball and putting up the shot What’s So Scary About the Celtics is that they can create open threes out

Of advantages that don’t even look like advantages the Thunder have two Defenders on porzingis down low and when Brown feeds Horford on the pick and pop Wiggins is going to slide over a bit towards White but then jump back towards porzingis when Horford sends the entry pass porzingis is going to capitalize on

This by just tapping the ball to White on the wing and even though it looks like Wiggins isn’t even that far from him to close out it’s just enough space for white to get the shot off with zero hesitation Tatum and Drew get into this inverted dribble handoff and Tatum

Driving off of the screen prompts the switch from camp Thomas but Simmons is trailing trying to recover back onto Tatum while Drew just pops out on the wing Tatum is going to sling it right back to him and Simmons isn’t really even that far from him but the speed at

Which Drew is able to catch it and release it makes it nearly impossible to defend when you couple that with the speed at which the Celtics make the extra pass even defenses that are quick to close out don’t stand a chance because more often than not they’re

Going to be just a split second to late to alter the shot it’s no wonder that the Celtics not only rank first in the league in catch and shoot three-point efficiency but they also rank second in catch and shoot three-point volume when they’re so good at creating even just

The smallest advantages and they have the shooters to accommodate such a high three-point volume why wouldn’t they lean into it but is this a double-edged sword as we all know High three-point volume makes you subject to this little thing called variance statistically speaking even if you’re a team that

Knocks down 39% of their threes on average you’re still going to have kns where you only shoot 28% from three but over the course of an entire season your three-point efficiency should average out to around 39% if that’s what you normally shoot the problem is that shooting variance can hit at the worst

Times we saw it back in 2018 the Houston Rockets missed 27 straight threes despite being the highest volume three-point shooting team in the NBA That season when it mattered most they just couldn’t hit the shots but there’s a difference between that 2018 Rockets team in this Boston Celtics team when

Talking specifically about perimeter shooting the Rockets were 14th in three-point efficiency that year knocking down 36% of their threes the Celtics are number one in three-point efficiency knocking down 39% of their threes does this mean that the Celtics can’t run into the same problem that the Rockets ran into absolutely not it’s

Entire possible that they shoot absolutely terrible over the course of an entire series it’s possible but it’s not likely the Celtics entire roster has been crafted around spacing quick decision-making and movement so even if they encounter the off shooting night here in there they have the infrastructure in place to balance it

Out not to mention they have the third best defense in the League this year and that should theoretically allow them to hold water even if the three-point shots aren’t falling another thing that’s working in their favor this year that’s different from last year is that they have christops porzingis who is one of

The very best postup players in the entire league so even if their shots aren’t falling they now have a coringas post up to lean into to try and generate points when they can’t knock down their threes now there are obviously certain factors at play that could make everything I’ve said in this video

Completely meaningless there’s things like injuries and of course it’s entirely possible for a player to have a sharp decline in efficiency in the playoffs I’m not saying that that will happen for the Celtics but it is a possibility for literally any team and any player and when it happens there’s

Not really a ton that you’re going to be able to do to fix it Additionally the Celtics do still run into the problem of getting stuck in ISO ball on occasion and that can turn them into their Own Worst Enemy obviously something like that stalls out their really potent

Offense and prevents them from leaning heavily into their strengths but in general it would take an extremely disciplined defense and an equally potent opposing offense to keep up with the Celtics team that’s not to say there isn’t a team like that in the NBA but there’s no doubt that the Celtics have

The potential to beat anyone in the league in a seven game series and in the Eastern Conference it looks like it’s going to be really tough for anybody to take them down hope you guys enjoyed this video I’d really appreciate it if you consider leaving a like and

Subscribing if you want to see more stuff like this shout out to my patrons for helping support the channel and make these videos possible thank you all so much for watching and I’ll see you in the next one

It’s no secret that the Boston Celtics have dominated the NBA this season, currently holding the best record in the NBA and being the first team to reach 60 wins.

Jayson Tatum has been having a career year, Jaylen Brown has lived up to the supermax contract, the Jrue Holiday trade and Kristaps Porzingis trade look like home runs. So is there any reason that this Boston Celtics team shouldn’t be a runaway favorite to win it all?

I dove into how they’ve crafted this roster around Jayson Tatum to maximize what he can do, and how up and down the roster they’re built to compliment their strengths. But can their weaknesses stay hidden?

➥ 𝙎𝙪𝙗𝙨𝙘𝙧𝙞𝙗𝙚: https://www.youtube.com/c/AlexHoops?sub_confirmation=1
➥ 𝙏𝙬𝙞𝙩𝙩𝙚𝙧: https://twitter.com/AlexHoops_
➥ 𝘽𝙚𝙘𝙤𝙢𝙚 𝙖 𝙋𝙖𝙩𝙧𝙤𝙣: https://patreon.com/AlexHoops

➥ 𝙖𝙗𝙤𝙪𝙩 𝙢𝙚
Providing NBA analysis by making film digestible and using analytics thoughtfully to contextualize on-court production. I cover the NBA in various capacities as a writer and digital content creator. If you love basketball and the NBA, be sure to subscribe to my channel.

DISCLAIMER: I do not claim ownership of any footage or clips used in this video. The use of these clips is protected under Fair Use Policy.

#BostonCeltics #Celtics #JaysonTatum