The Boston Celtics ended their six-game road trip on a high note Tuesday night in Sacramento.
After a heavy loss against the Utah Jazz on Sunday, the C’s bounced back with an impressive performance against the Kings. They jumped out to a 19-point lead with a 40-point lead in the third quarter, and this time, they didn’t look back as they cruised to a 132-109 victory.
The Celtics’ five starters have scored in double digits. Jason Tatum and Jaylen Brown led with 36 and 27 points, respectively. Derrick White added 20 points and 10 assists for his career-high double-double.
Dearon Fox led the Kings with 18 points. Domontas Sabonis hit a triple-double with 16 points, 13 rebounds and 12 assists.
The Celtics finished their road trip 4-2 and will take home a Friday night showdown with the Indiana Pacers. First, here are three Celtics-Kings takeaways.
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Clear ball movement and avoidance of turnovers were the keys to the Celtics’ victory on Tuesday night.
Boston tallied 32 assists on 49 field goals and only turned the ball over five times – just twice through the first three quarters. On the other hand, the Kings have had 14 turnovers, nine of them coming on Celtics steals. The C team finished with 21 points from Sacramento’s turnovers.
This is the beginning of an encouraging trend. They entered Tuesday with 12.2 turnovers per game since the All-Star break, but lost just six on Sunday to Utah and excelled in that category again in Sacramento. If the Celtics can continue to sponsor basketball, it will go a long way toward helping them finish the last nine games of the regular season strong and gain much-needed momentum ahead of the playoffs.
Celtics superstar Robert Williams has been out of action since March 3 with a hamstring injury and his absence was stark. Boston went 4-5 in that period and bad rebounding was a big reason for that.
He returned to court on Tuesday night and felt its impact immediately. Williams was again relieved into action with only 21 minutes off the bench, but he was active during that time with six points, seven boards (two offensively) and a block.
It wasn’t a perfect night for the Time Lord as he committed five personal fouls. However, this is clearly a different team than the Celtics when Williams is in the mix. It is no coincidence that their best match of the month came on the night of his return.
Jason Tatum snaps into slack
Jason Tatum wasn’t at his best during the road trip, but he finished it off with a great performance in Sacramento. The four-time All-Star quickly asserted his dominance over the lackluster Kings defense with 15 first-quarter points (8-13 FG).
Tatum kept his foot on the gas for the final three frames and was particularly lethal from inside the arc. While he wasn’t quite able to get back on track from 3-point range (2-for-7), he hit 12 of 18 2-putts and reached the line on 11 free throw attempts. This is another area he’ll be looking to improve as he missed five shots from the charity bar, but it’s encouraging that he’s staying on offense and making his way to the basket.
With 36 points, Tatum tied the great Larry Bird for the most points in a single season in franchise history (39). Bird accomplished this feat during the 1987-88 campaign.
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