Was Hugo Gonzalez as ADVERTISED in Celtics Debut? | Garden Report From Vegas

Was Hugo Gonzalez as ADVERTISED in Celtics Debut? | Garden Report From Vegas

Hey, Bobby Manning here. Noah Delazelle alongside and the Celtics just beat the Grizzlies convincingly in their first summer league game here in Las Vegas. We’re outside Thomas and Mac Arena reacting to Ugo Gonzalez’s debut, which is what we were both most excited for. We both agreed on that and I think we saw everything that the scouting report said about him within the first few minutes even. I think he exactly met expectations and they were high. Like I expected to see a well-rounded player that plays really hard and shows that he can potentially defend at a high level and he was all those things. But I also I didn’t think he was going to go for 30 and he didn’t. He had 12 on four of 12 shootings. So to me this was like exactly what I expected from him based on what we’d heard based on the limited film that was available uh in his debut game. Yeah. And the threes fell which can go both ways. I’m sure it will throughout this summer league for him. But that could be a swing skill for him. And that’s mostly the role we saw him play in this game was spotting up, screening a little bit, popping out to the perimeter and catching and shooting some threes. So, he got the opportunities to get those off. He said that was his goal uh coming into the summer league. So, that was a big part of his debut here. But also some point guard play and that’s what Matt Reynolds said they wanted was to put him in different positions cuz honestly, I don’t even think they know fully what his role is going to be with this team yet, whether it’s this year or even long term cuz he’s so early in his development, particularly on the offensive side. But the defense flashed. I love the block he had helping out. I love the energy he showed. He was getting screened a ton and he had to navigate that. And I think aside from a few turnovers here, this was a pretty clean and disciplined game from him. He looked comfortable out there. Even though he said later he was it was hard and it was fast. Yeah. And again, 19 years old. Like that’s we’re going to keep coming back to that because there are other guys in the roster that have been there a lot, you know, a lot longer and they’re still a lot older than him. He’s 19 and I think I expected a 19-year-old to look a little bit more frazzled, to be a little bit more sped up, but he he really wasn’t. And I think it points back to the the one thing that we know about him, and that’s that he’s been on a professional basketball team now. Uh, and he called that his pre- rookie season. He’s played with nine former NBA players on his most recent year. And all of that has been apparent both in his game and then also just the way he interacts with the media. The way he kind of discussed going one for five from the free throw line. He was so stern like he was like, I that’s not acceptable. Like I can’t allow that. I won’t allow that. And so, uh, there’s a lot to like about him and I think, you know, no, nothing that I’m going to overreact to and say like what based on what we saw today, this is how he’s going to perform as an NBA player, but certainly the flashes of things that you had heard about, you saw a little bit in action. Here’s Gonzalez talking about his debut today. I mean, it was hard to to to catch up with the with the pace and everything. You know, when I was in in Europe, game is a lot of times a little bit slower. We’re trying to have the that possession until the end here. if you got a shot, you better take it. So that that’s actually making the the game really up and up and down and you got to you got to catch up with that if you want to play. So I’m just trying to adapt and just trying to adapt as as soon as I can. So I, as I said before, contribute to the to the team. So we discussed this with Kevin O’ Conor in the podcast we did out here leading up to the weekend. The breakthrough player who’s going to actually impact the Boston Celtics from the summer league team. The fun thing is three of the guys who are headliners on the roster between Gonzalez, Baylor Shyman, and Jordan Walsh play that position that Jason Tatum’s going to vacate for most of the season, if not all of it. So, there’s room for one of those guys, maybe even multiple of those guys to play NBA minutes this year. Now, who’s actually going to emerge out of that group? I know Kevin like Shyman, Shyman’s probably shown the most out of those three players so far, but he struggled the most here today shooting, finding his spots on the floor. Gonzalez looked like he fit in pretty well, complimentary, but he’s the youngest of them. And then Walsh looked amazing. I loved his game here today and his approach, but he this is three years in for him now and he still hasn’t cracked that rotation. So, I think even after some results in this first game and you know some game NBA games for both Walsh and Shyman, we have no idea which of the three is most likely going to break through here. Do you have a direction you’re leaning after this one? No. No, and I wouldn’t change my direction based off of one similarly game because we’re going to have a couple more of these. Yeah, I think Shyman like as far as who’s most ready to impact the team right now, first of all, just his age. He has he’s what, 24 now? So, he has five years on Gonzalez. He’s the best shooter, three years on Wall-E, and he’s the only one of the three that I’ve seen perform well at the NBA level. Jordan has been very limited minutes. And again, Gonzalez has yet to suit up. So, it’s no fault of his own. No, no fault of his, but like certainly hard harder to picture because we just don’t know what that’s going to look like. I will say he was going up against Jaylen Wells for most of this game who was one of the best rookies in the class last year. So that was a nice thing that you actually got to see him competing against a real NBA player. Um but I don’t really have a strong inclination for it’s like this is the guy I’m going to hedge my bets on. It’s kind of what makes this fun with each game we’re getting a little bit more data on on who might separate themselves from the pack. Um I’d probably still pick Baylor just because of his experience, but there were definitely moments today where I was like I’m seeing Ugo do things that I haven’t seen the other two do on the defensive end. And that’s exciting part of this team is these guys could impact the NBA roster this year. And we’re focused on the wings, but centers in this game, too. And Mari Williams played a solid game in his debut. Charles Bassie appeared out of nowhere and had the best game of anyone in this one. So, we’ll hear more from the centers tomorrow, but what was your impression of those guys? Yeah, Bassie was awesome. I mean, we didn’t even know he was on the roster because he’s not listed on the official roster. So, all of a sudden, he’s warming up and next thing you know, he’s out playing everybody. So, we should have noticed he was at that other practice. I’m being We noticed there was there was a couple people I didn’t recognize. I think he was the only one that was a player. Um but yeah, you know, he was there today. He impacted things on both ends and just talking to some people from the Spurs organization, they really liked him last year. He stepped up when WBY went down. Uh the question with him, I think the big one is health and whether he can stay available. He’s already dealt with a bunch of different knee injuries and he’s what 24 25 years old. So that’s the big question. I don’t know if the Celtics view him as somebody that they’re just kind of giving an opportunity to showcase his talent or if they see a pathway forward for him. We’ll probably get a little more clarity on that in the next few days. Yeah, Matt Reynolds didn’t have any indication there yet, but a pleasant surprise in this first summer league game here. We are back with a practice tomorrow, so we’ll have updates from that and then backtoback games on Sunday and Monday before I’m out of here. But still a lot more to come here from Vegas for Noah Delazelle. I’m Bobby Manning and the Celtics beat the Grizzlies to open up their summer league slate here at Thomas and Max Center. We’ll talk to you soon.

LAS VEGAS — Hugo González stuffed the stat sheet in his Summer League debut, flashing two-way upside with 12 points, 4 rebounds, 5 assists, 2 blocks, and 3 made threes. The Garden Report’s Noa Dalzell and Bobby Manning recap the Celtics’ 92-78 win over the Grizzlies from Las Vegas and break down Hugo’s impact, Jordan Walsh’s strong outing, and early takeaways from Boston’s first game.

Visit our MERCH Store: https://shop.clnsmedia.com
Join Our Discord Server: https://clnsmedia.com/discord

CLNS Media is Powered by:

💰 Prize Picks – https://prizepicks.onelink.me/LME0/CLNS
Download the app today and use Code CLNS when you sign up & Get $50 instantly when you play $5!

Make sure to SUBSCRIBE to The Garden Report on CLNS Media!
🍎Apple: https://bit.ly/44NYVRP
✳️Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/svjft9sk
📺YouTube: https://youtube.com/@CLNSMEDIA

Make sure to SUBSCRIBE to the Cedric Maxwell Podcast on CLNS Media!
📺YouTube: http://youtube.com/@CLNSMEDIA
🍎Apple: http://tinyurl.com/2ajuv4f8
✳️Spotify: http://tinyurl.com/3nbmja9z

Make sure to SUBSCRIBE to the BIG NBA Podcast on CLNS Media!
📺YouTube: http://youtube.com/@CLNSMEDIA
🍎Apple: https://tinyurl.com/24n2h6fx:
✳️Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/8f9e756c

Make sure to SUBSCRIBE to You Got Boston on CLNS Media!
🍎Apple: https://tinyurl.com/mpsv8kj7
✳️Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/5xx2tudn
📺YouTube: https://youtube.com/@CLNSMEDIA

Make sure to SUBSCRIBE to the Bob Ryan & Jeff Goodman Podcast on CLNS Media!
📺YouTube: ⁠https://www.youtube.com/@CelticsCLNS
🍎Apple: ⁠https://tinyurl.com/37f5jhwj
✳️Spotify: ⁠https://tinyurl.com/mvbvywpe

#celtics #NBA #BostonCeltics
The CLNS Media Network is the leading provider for video/audio content. CLNS is a fully credentialed member of the media with access to all NFL/NBA/NHL/MLB teams & venues.
———————————————————————————

CLNS’ rebuilt their YouTube community in less than 12 months, during a pandemic that attacked sports.

Visit the Official Home of CLNS Sports Coverage – https://clnsmedia.com

Twitter – https://twitter.com/CLNSMedia
Celtics – https://twitter.com/celticsclns
Patriots – https://twitter.com/patriotsclns
Bruins – https://twitter.com/bruinsclns
Red Sox – https://twitter.com/redsoxclns
Non-Sports – https://twitter.com/northstation
Facebook – http://facebook.com/clnsmedia
INSTA – http://Instagram.com/clnsmedia
INSTA Celtics – http://Instagram.com/celticsclns
INSTA History – http://Instagram.com/nbahistoryclns