Pete Stringer

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PHILADELPHIA – Al Horford dominated the third quarter in Philadelphia on Sunday afternoon.

Unfortunately, he never scored again, and the Celtics led a 13-point lead slip away in a sloppy fourth quarter. The Celtics fell to a scrappy Sixers team, 105-99, and wasted a 27-point, eight-rebound effort from their offseason acquisition.

Horford had 12 points at the half, and he went 11-for-16 from the field overall, scoring 15 of the Celtics’ first 20 points in the third quarter. While the Celtics generally work their offense from the inside out, looking to kick to perimeter scorers for 3-pointers, on Sunday Horford was operating in the post, backing down opponents, and making plays for himself in the paint.

“Guys are really looking for me, and I’m just trying to make plays,” Horford said of the renewed emphasis on getting him the ball in scoring positions. “The way that they played me tonight, they just forced me to go and score, as opposed to what I do so much, which is just get it in the seams and pass it out to the guys for threes.
“They took that away, and that’s what really freed me up tonight.”

Brad Stevens has been talking about getting the team to “play through” Horford in recent days, and it seems like the message has gotten through to his team.  Horford’s had 16 field goal attempts in each game on Friday and Sunday, marking the most shots he’s taken in a game since he took 18 shots on January 7 against the New Orleans Pelicans.

Horford scored just 14 on Friday despite taking the same amount of shots, but his 27 points against the Sixers were the most he’s scored in Celtics green.

“He was great. Al played great today, there’s no question about it,” Stevens said. “He was active, he was aggressive. He was really engaged.”

Of course, with Isaiah Thomas sitting out his second consecutive game with a right knee bone bruise, the Celtics had to look elsewhere for scoring. To that end, everyone who appeared in the game got in the scoring column. For a while, though, it looked like Horford was going to be scoring every time down the floor.

“It felt like the match-up he got was in our favor, so we wanted to feed him and play off of him as much as possible,” Jae Crowder said after the game. “The majority of the game we did a good job of doing that. We got away from it a little bit late, and made it tough on ourselves.”

Avery Bradley was the first Celtic to speak with the media after the game, and he told reporters that he felt like too many times, the Celtics were playing “one-on-one basketball” instead of making the right plays for the team. And that seemed to be the case as the game got sloppy in the fourth quarter, and the ball stopped moving around the way it normally does.

Asked about Horford’s performance, Bradley made it clear that the Celtics should have kept going to their big man.

“Al didn’t only have it going on the offensive end, but he was finding guys; he was making plays for our team,” Bradley said. “We should have got him the ball even more down the stretch.”

The Celtics are right back on the court Monday as they host the 42-27 Washington Wizards, who sit a game-and-a-half behind them in the Eastern Conference. Especially considering that Thomas’ status is unknown at this point, Horford will likely be a focus for the offensive again tomorrow.

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C's Focus on Feeding Horford

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Photos: Celtics vs. Sixers - Mar. 19, 2017

BROOKLYN – The Celtics were missing a few things with Isaiah Thomas out of the lineup on Friday, so Jae Crowder did his best to help pick up the slack in Brooklyn Friday night.

It wasn’t always pretty, but Boston held on for its third straight victory. The Celtics spent a lot of time trading baskets with the Nets late in the fourth, but they eventually prevailed, 98-95, to improve their record to 44-25, including an Eastern Conference-best road record of 21-16.

As the King of the Fourth convalesced back in Boston with a sore knee, Crowder dropped nine of his 24 points in the final stanza, the loudest two of which came on a head-fake and baseline one-handed slam that sent the Celtics bench into hysterics.

Crowder’s dunk, as well as his efforts throughout the night certainly caught the eye of Celtics Coach Brad Stevens, who had to shuffle the deck without Thomas, his usual ace in the hole.

“I thought Jae Crowder was terrific tonight. Even when we were in the first half, struggling to get a shot, he comes out of a timeout and shoots it in,” Stevens said of Crowder, who also grabbed 12 rebounds.  “He made those shots all night when we couldn’t get anything else going.”

Seriously, before we move on, find the clip. Watch Crowder’s dunk. Then watch the bench react.

That play, which followed a Crowder 3-pointer, gave Boston an energy boost down the stretch, as well as a 91-85 lead with 2:52 remaining. After the jam, Crowder, who careened out behind the basket (he was fouled on the play and as such, he barely landed on his feet), flexed both guns in the seats behind the baseline for a crowd that had already been chanting “Let’s go Celtics” earlier in the evening.

“It was almost a home court advantage,” Crowder said of the environment at Barclays Center. “Early in the game we had a ‘Let’s go Celtics’ chant, we heard that.  We knew there was a great amount of Celtics fans in the building tonight.”

Prior to that flurry, the Nets had been knocking down 3-pointers, and giving the Celtics all that they could handle as the teams traded hoops. Crowder said that the team decided it was time to making some winning plays and put the game away.

“That was somewhat of a winning play,” Crowder said to reporters, to which a random teammate chimed in, “He barely got up.”

When the Celtics need a bucket in the fourth quarter, they’re usually looking for Thomas to make a play. Instead, much like they did against Minnesota, the Celtics played through Al Horford, who had exactly half of his 14 points, eight rebounds and four assists in the last quarter. Both of those fourth-quarter assists set up Crowders six-point mini-run late in the game.

While Stevens had told reporters before the game that he would need multiple players to make up for Thomas’ absence, those who took the floor had to adjust to the idea that they’re be a lot more touches to go around with IT on the shelf.

“There’s a lot more shot opportunities,” Crowder said of his teammates playing without Thomas. “For real, our offense, we run a lot of stuff for (Thomas). A lot of guys were getting a lot of looks that they probably weren’t used to getting.”

The Celtics will need more of the same from the rest of the roster, as they head to Philadelphia to play the 76ers Sunday afternoon, and they’ll again be playing without Thomas.

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Without IT, Crowder Gives C’s a Boost

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Photos: Celtics vs. Nets - Mar. 17, 2017

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The Celtics were cruising along midway through the third quarter of this game, once holding a 13-point lead, but the Clippers came alive with the help of Jamal Crawford (19 points), who checked in off the bench to start dominating the game.  Crawford single-handedly sparked an 11-0 run to close the third quarter, and continued to pour it on as the fourth quarter began.

Crawford’s long-range shooting (he knocked down three 3-pointers in this stretch) and free-wheeling style had the Celtics scrambling on defense. Crawford basically took the game over for a 10-minute stretch and reinvigorated the Clippers with his energy.

When the Celtics tried to rally late in the fourth, Crawford came up with a 4-point play (3-pointer and a foul) to give the Clippers a 105-89 lead and effectively put the Celtics away.

The Celtics, not to be knocked out early, cranked up the defensive intensity in the final minutes, but had dug themselves a hole to deep from which to climb out when they fell behind by 18 points with 3:33 to play.

Isaiah Thomas dropped 32 points on the night, and attacked the basket all night, but even with his efforts to carry the load, the Celtics got little else from anyone not named Marcus Smart (21 points) or Avery Bradley (14 points).

Thomas was very effective in getting to the basket despite guys like Blake Griffin and DeAndre Jordan trying to engulf him at the rim. Overall, the Celtics point guard bounced back nicely from his mishap Sunday night in Phoenix where he missed a critical free throw in the final seconds, then turned over the ball leading to the Suns’ game-winner at the buzzer.

Meanwhile, the C’s were shorthanded again Monday night, as Al Horford (elbow) missed his second straight game and Jonas Jerebko (flu) was a late scratch.

Brad Stevens on Jamal Crawford's big game in the second half.

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Keys to the Game: Clippers 116, Celtics 102

Isaiah Thomas has built a well-deserved reputation as the King of the Fourth, but he managed to make two critical mistakes in the final seconds on Sunday that cost the Celtics what would have been a comeback win in Phoenix.

Thomas, who’s usually automatic at the charity stripe, missed a free throw in the final seconds that kept the game at a two-point lead. After Eric Bledsoe beat Jae Crowder off the dribble for a game-tying lay-up, Thomas then fumbled the inbounds pass, and the Suns canned a buzzer-beating 3-pointer to beat the Celtics in dramatic fashion.

Then again, without Thomas’s 4th quarter efforts, the Celtics may have lost the game much earlier. Thomas scored 14 of his 35 points in the final frame, and also handed out a few key assists down the stretch to set up an Amir Johnson dunk and a Jaylen Brown 3-ball.

“You don’t want to turn it over at the time, but Ulis made a heck of a shot,” Celtics Coach Brad Stevens said of the game-winner.

That said, the Celtics really lost this game in the first half quarter, when they hit just six field goals in the first quarter and seven in the second, and were dominated in the paint. The final points in the paint tally was 52-32 Suns, and most of that advantage was established in the first half. The Celtics scored just one basket in the paint in the first 12 minutes of action.

While Thomas had a huge game against the Suns, Terry Rozier stepped in off the bench and contributed 14 points in just under 20 minutes off the bench. The C’s certainly needed the extra help in the backcourt, as Avery Bradley was an afternoon scratch with a sore hamstring.

Brown (14 points) got the start in Bradley’s place, but Rozier’s back-to-back 3s late in the third quarter helped bring the Celtics back into striking distance. The Celtics trailed 79-64 with 3:11 left in the third, but Rozier’s 3-pointers fueled a 13-2 run that closed the quarter and brought Boston back.

Early in the fourth, Rozier made an impressive steal along the baseline that would salvage a bad possession and set up a Thomas 3-pointer.

Brad Stevens on how the game was actually lost in Phoenix.

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Keys to the Game: Celtics 106, Suns 109

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BOSTON – For the last two games, all eyes have been on Isaiah Thomas.

Well, except for his own. Nobody knows where Thomas’ eyes are, because he’s seeing things that nobody else can.

Whether it’s teammates in unlikely spots, passing angles that only reveal themselves after the ball has been zipped through the eye of the needle, or finding just enough daylight to launch a rainbow 3-pointer despite a hand in his grill, Thomas is seeing everything.

How’s he doing it? Rookie Jaylen Brown, who at one point got assists on three consecutive buckets from Thomas, thinks the Celtics point guard has an anatomical advantage.

“I really do think he has eyes on the back of his head. I think he can actually see behind him,” said Brown. “Sometimes when he’s in the paint with the trees, and he just whips it out to the 3-point line, it’s like, ‘How did he see that?’ I think he has eyes in the back of his head.

Of course, if you were watching Friday’s game against Miami with your own eyes, you’re probably asking, “Isaiah Thomas passes the ball?”

Toward the end of his career-best 52-point game, it was pretty clear Thomas was thinking score first, score second and score third. Down the stretch of his 29-point fourth quarter, Thomas was a one a man wrecking crew, and if he needed help, he wasn’t showing it.

His eyes were fixed on the basket. He finished the game without an assist.

“If they would have said something, then I would have really tried to not score and get assists. But after the game last time, I was upset, and they were like, ‘You scored 52 bro. Who cares about your asissts?’” Thomas said.

“So I wasn’t trippin’. When they weren’t tripping, I was good.”

Thomas wasn’t tripping, or gripping and ripping for that matter. Tuesday night against the Jazz, he was singing a different tune. Thomas was setting up teammates, dealing dimes and making them pretty, too.  He handed out a career-best 15 assists to go with his 29 points, and perhaps more importantly, he mesmerized the Jazz defense to the point where he had Utah’s defenders forgetting about their own guys.

“When I attack, they show more than one guy. My job is to find the open guy. I tried to do that,” Thomas said after the game, surrounded as always, but this time by reporters instead of ball-hawking defenders under the basket. “I’m just taking what the defense gives me.”

The Jazz’s defense was giving up 3-pointers, to the tune of 17 made 3-point field goals for the Celtics, tying the franchise record set – wait for it – on Friday at TD Garden. And while the Celtics are no strangers to the arc (only three teams attempt more treys than Boston’s 31.6 3FGAs per game), most of Tuesday night’s bombs were wide open thanks to Thomas’ penetration and magnetism in the paint.

“I don’t know how much more attention he can attract. He’s been doing it here for two years,” Celtics Coach Brad Stevens said, going on to compliment his point guard as a “tough shot maker.” After all, Thomas wasn’t too shabby shooting the ball or finishing at the rim. But perhaps most impressive was Thomas’ ability to make the right plays at the right times.

Thomas only committed one turnover in just over 35 minutes of play.

“It’s all about making the right read over and over,” Stevens said of Thomas’ ability to find teammates even when he’s surrounded at the rim has nowhere else to go. “All (great players) have the right read; it’s been thought out and lived so many times, they just make it as part of a habit.”

How he got the ball to them, though, is anyone’s guess.

“I don’t know how he saw me,” Al Horford said of Thomas’ blind assist that found him wide open at the top of the key for an easy three. “It’s very impressive how he’s able to find us out there.”

Either Thomas truly can see behind him, or he’s just passing to where his teammates were supposed to be, and they’re holding up their end of the bargain. Thomas credited that to experience with the Celtics system, as well as just playing together with his teammates for a while.

We had to ask: Can you actually see your teammates when you draw multiple defenders under the hoop and then kick it out for wide-open shots?

“Sometimes I can’t see,” Thomas said. “You’ve just got to trust where your guys will be. That’s being familiar with the guys you play with. Most of the time guys are in the right spots. When I can’t see, I just, I know Jae (Crowder)’s gonna be on my right side.”

Basically, Thomas is making passes that not only have to be seen to be believed, but he has to believe his teammates are there to see them himself.

“He’s just getting better and he’s getting more and more confident,” Brown said. “He has so much attention on him. For me, it’s just simple plays, simple basketball. All I’ve got to do is just finish. He makes the game easier for me.”

Hours after being edged out for the Eastern Conference Player of the Month honors by John Wall, Thomas was picking up where he left off on Friday. He made it clear during the game and after the game that he thought he should have won the award.

In the opening minutes, Thomas came out of the gate looking to score, but was also distributing the basketball. Thomas assisted Jae Crowder on the Celtics’ second hoop of the game, and had doled out seven during the first half. And in the first three minutes of the second half, Thomas racked up four more dimes.

He was also putting up rainbow jumpers, hand-in-his-grill 3-pointers and Cirque du Soleil-ups. Once the game was in hand, Thomas finally got to the free throw line. Fans who hadn’t had a chance to chant “M.V.P.” yet finally got their wish.  Twice.