The Celtics End The Year With Yet Another Win, Cementing One Of Their Best Regular Seasons In Franchise History

Brian Babineau. Getty Images.

For some, Game 82 of the regular season was extremely meaningful. Just ask the Warriors how they feel this morning following their Game 82. For the Celtics, they haven't played a game that actually mattered in terms of the standings for quite some time, but that doesn't mean their Game 82 was insignificant. As someone who believes every single dribble from July to June matters, there's always something to take away from these games, even as the defending Champs who were resting the majority of their players and have had their seeding locked up for weeks.

I looked at yesterday as more of a celebration. I'm not sure enough people fully understand what they just watched for the last 6 months. Even with one of the worst stretches of basketball known to man for about 6+ weeks, the 2024-25 Boston Celtics completed what was easily one of the best regular seasons of my entire life, and I'm old as shit

The final tally?

Record: 61-21 (3rd)

Offense: 119.5 (2nd)

Defense: 110.1 (4th)

Net Rating: +9.4 (2nd)

+/-: +9.1 (3rd)

This team never had a losing streak longer than 2 games (twice). They once again, had more 30 point leads than 15 point deficits. They finished with 12 different 25 point wins, and 8 30 point wins. They had the 2nd best road record in NBA history (33-8). Their offense, which put up 1.20 points per possession, was the 4th best offense in NBA history. Their 1,457 3PM were the most in NBA history. Defensively, they allowed the fewest FTA in NBA history. 

All of that is legitimately insane when you also factor in two things:

1. This was a title defense season

2. Porzingis missed 40 games, Jrue/Jaylen/Horford each missed around 20+ games 

Think about that for a second. Of the Celtics starters, only two players qualified for the 65+ game mark. That team still put up 61 wins with a +9.1 differential.

NOT NORMAL

Just like the dominance of the 2023-24 Celtics, we all know none of this matters unless they are once again the last team standing. For this team and this franchise, that's the standard. That's the pressure they run towards, not away from. But I do think it's important to take a step back and process what we just experienced. If you're around my age, it was one of the best regular seasons of your entire life. That's not hyperbole, that's simply a fact. 

Now that we've gone through all 82, it means the title defense is officially underway. But before we start to focus on the games that actually matter, we first have to talk quickly about the season finale. Let's begin.

The Good

- Death, taxes, and Payton Pritchard becoming the best player on Earth in Game 82. As we know, this is Pritchard's time to shine, especially when the opponent is horrendous. Every year, he's given the keys to the offense for these games, and he responds every single time

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These are the moments that Pro Am Pritchard was made for. Nobody, and I mean nobody, is more dominant in games that do not matter while playing guys who are barely good enough for the NBA quite like Payton Pritchard. Heading into the game, we all knew the deal, the Hornets I'm sure knew the deal, and yet nobody could stop him. It's one of the fun wrinkles to these Game 82s that haven't mattered for the Celtics in forever. We all knew it was Pritchard's time to cook, so to see him immediately go out and cook everyone from the start of the game until his final minute was a great way to spend a Sunday afternoon. 

And sure, there will be some out there, I'm sure,e that have the take of

"oh cool, let's see him do this against a good team in a game that matters"

and those people are miserable. Lighten up man! It's Game 82 fun! It's not that serious! Plus, for all we know this is something that helps Payton catch a rhythm ahead of the playoffs for when the games actually do matter and the teams are much, much better. 

But it's also fun to just watch Payton cook the shit out of teams. The Hornets tried everything, face guarding him, Box and 1s, but none of it mattered. You do not stop Pro Am Pritchard in Game 82. Nobody can. I can't lie, I was nervous for every second he was on the floor given he's a top 8 rotation guy, I didn't love the moments where it looked like he was grabbing his right wrist, but it appears he came out of the game clean and we have nothing to worry about. Instead, we can look back and enjoy what was another dominant end of season Payton Pritchard performance.

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- Much like Pritchard, Sam Hauser also did his thing in Game 82, just like he did in Game 81 against these same Hornets. A solid 15 points on 4-9 (4-7), this is another instance of a guy getting some cardio in, filling his role by knocking down his open looks, and hopefully is someone who is able to take this momentum into next weekend

What I didn't realize is that Sam Hauser would go the entire season without missing a single FTA

and sure, he was just 11-11 on the year, but why would you focus on the details? Grow up. A 100% season is a 100% season where I come from. Your favorite player didn't have a 100% FT shooting season, I know that much.

- Ho hum, another dominant Luke Kornet showing, this time with efficient offensive production (5-9) to go along with 4 blocks. The way he was able to use his verticality to own the paint was tremendous, and while he won't win MIP this year, there are few players in the league this season who truly live up to what that award should be about more than Kornet

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Given what we see on the floor combined with how much Jayson Tatum clearly loves playing with Kornet and is open about how good he is, I find it extremely likely Brad Stevens figures out how to keep him around after this season. They say back up guard grow on trees in the NBA, but I'm not sure the same is also true when it comes to back up centers. It's definitely not the case when it comes to a backup center having the skillset and consistent production of Luke Kornet. He's turned himself into a starting quality big……as the Celtics 3rd center. What a season, what a player.

- Listen, I'm trying to stay level headed here. I'm trying to be rational. So I'm not going to say what every single one of us is thinking after watching these two clips. I'm going to let you form your own opinion

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It's OK, this is a safe space. We're in the trust tree. You see it. I know you see it, you know you see it. Again, I'm not going to say it, but we're all thinking it.

- Perhaps it was a result of the security that came with his new 2 year deal, but in my opinion, yesterday was easily the best JD Davison has ever looked as a Celtic. Nothing crazy, just a solid 9/4 and a +7 in his 17 minutes, but you have to remember the bar is literally on the floor regarding his expectations. 

Having said that, he made a 3PM, I enjoyed his improved floater, and for the first time in forever, it didn't feel like JD was hesitant once he had the ball. I'm sure the quality of the opponent had a lot to do with that, considering it came against a glorified G-League team, but whatever. You still have to go out and produce, and his buckets down the stretch were pretty big to help prevent what would have been a horrible loss to end the season.

The Bad

- I'm probably the only one who cares about this, but the Hospital Celtics brutal shooting in their showings to finish the season pretty much cooked the Celts ability to finish top 3 in eFG%. Just 38/31% yesterday against one of the worst defenses you'll ever see, that was tough to stomach. Not cracking 95 points even with everyone out was pretty embarrassing, given you were at home playing a terrible defense, and deep down if we all tell the truth I think most of us were expecting a performance closer to what we saw in the first meeting the other day when the regulars were active.

I mean, they scored 36 points in two combined quarters in the 2nd and 3rd. If that's not bad, then what is?

- Part of those shooting struggles came via Baylor, who finished a rough 2-14 (2-10). He was still a +10 in his minutes and was able to contribute in other areas, but I did not expect that tough of a shooting performance given how well he's been playing lately. I'd say that was one of the few disappointments from yesterday, but perhaps this just means he's actually only built for game that count? That's what I'm telling my brain to block out the fact that he couldn't really score against a terrible defense.

Plus, he keeps having moments like this

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so I'm willing to overlook the bricks.

- I love how Torrey Craig has morphed into Brissy 2.0. Absolutely ZERO buckets, but great everywhere else. It's remarkable really how he can't buy a single bucket no matter who the opponent is, yesterday was another 0-3 (0-2), but he is super active everywhere else which somewhat makes up for it.

But as a guy that is billed as a 3&D player, I'm going to need to see him live up to the "3" part should he ever need to get the call in a playoff game. He's shooting like 21% in April, and the Celts haven't played a good team in forever. There's a reason he was a buyout guy, and I think we're seeing it.

Love the energy, love the mentality, but the lack of shooting is a bit surprising given his career sample.

The Ugly

- Classic Celts to build an early 21 point lead, only to eventually blow the whole thing once we got to the 4th quarter. That's what happens when you don't make a shot for 2 quarters, and it was a nice reminder that even the Hospital Celtics are not immune to these types of lapses. 

On one hand, it helped make Game 82 exciting down the stretch which as a fan, I didn't hate, but on the other hand, it's very embarrassing that you couldn't hold a lead against that type of team. Maybe it was settling offensively, maybe it was just a make-or-miss situation, who knows. But given what we saw from this same group against ORL, I wouldn't say the Hospital Celtics had that strong of a showing to end the year.

At the end of the day, still won though. A win is a win is a win last time I checked, and the Celts end the year and begin their title defense on an absolute roll. We did it, we made it through the season largely unscathed. With a week off, we'll know tomorrow night who the Celts open their title defense with, my guess is it'll be Orlando but we'll see. It's crazy to think the regular season is over given it feel like things just started, but now it's time to get serious. Back to back 60 win seasons is cool and all, but you know what's cooler?

Back to back titles.

Let us pray.