Boston Celtics: Efficient 3-point shooting night clinches big win over Clippers

The Boston Celtics enjoyed one of their best 3-point shooting nights of the season against a Kawhi-less Los Angeles Clippers outfit on Tuesday evening. The Celtics shot 50 percent from beyond the arc on 32 3-point attempts, which, ultimately, gave them the separation they needed in order to close out this big-time win to go three on the bounce, after an extremely disappointing month of February.

After dropping three straight games on their last road trip before the All-Star break, the Celtics returned home last week to take on a four-game home set before the break. Even though we’re not even halfway through the season yet, critics were hyping up this homestand as a season-changing run of games. The Celtics have answered their critics with three important wins so far.

3-point shooting is the key for the Boston Celtics revival

The Clippers game was arguably going to be their toughest challenge here. However, Kawhi Leonard was missing from the starting five, and it later became apparent that he’d be sitting the entirety of this matchup out with back spasms. For the Celtics, they got All-Star wing Jaylen Brown back after missing the Wizards game with knee soreness. Instantly it looked a much more manageable task than it could’ve been.

The Celtics have struggled in many areas at points during this first part of the season. 3-point shooting has been one of these areas at times, with so many key shooters missing extended runs of games to start the year. Last night, though, the Celtics were exactly where they wanted to be in that area. Boston went 16-of-32 from deep on the night, led by Kemba Walker who made six of his 12 attempts.

Kemba is finding his feet after missing the first 11 games of the season. He’s been great over the last three games in Boston, as he’s led the Celtics offense by shooting 44.8 percent from 3-point range and orchestrating with 20 assists and just four turnovers. For the Celtics to do what we expected them to be able to before the season started, Kemba is going to need to be himself at a consistent level to help the offense thrive, that’s what’s been happening of late. So long may it continue.

The Clippers are the best 3-point shooting team in the league making 41.8 percent of their shots from deep, so Boston’s deep threat was going to have to rival that of LA’s in order to give them their shot at winning this one. The Clippers made 18-of-38 in this one, but the Celts were that little more efficient in theirs. Kemba carried the Celtics’ 3-point threat, as he was so effective off the high screen, and getting to his spots to give him open looks. Outside of Kemba, Payton Pritchard made 4-of-7 from deep, Jaylen Brown and Semi Ojeleye both went 3-of-4, Jayson Tatum made one of his five attempts, and Jeff Teague knocked down his solo attempt.

The 3-point shot will remain important for the Celtics, but when you have interior offense flowing as well, it doesn’t matter who’s making these 3s. Tristan Thompson had another solid game inside, whilst Brown caused plenty of problems moving to the basket. The Celtics found themselves with a ton of good lucks on Tuesday against a very competent defense.

Even without Kawhi, this is a performance to admire from the Celtics and one they needed at this point of the year. Boston will look to keep the streak rolling against the Toronto Raptors on Thursday as we go into the All-Star break.