You got a date Friday night? It’s okay if you don’t. The Boston Celtics have a date with the Brooklyn Nets, and you can watch. I’m here to prepare you for this game with a handful of plays, matchups, and tactics that could decide the winner. Let’s get into it.
Nets head coach Jordi Fernandez loves to play on the front foot. Despite the youth of his roster and the transient nature of many of the role players, he’s going to get aggressive in order to pressure his opponents. That involves a lot of hedging in pick-and-rolls when his team is facing pull-up shooters.
That’s a tactic in which the roll man defender rises above the screen to disrupt the ballhandler’s momentum, then retreats to cover his own man. Typically, this involves someone stunting the roller or providing early help if a pass comes over the top. It takes away easy pull-up threes (something the Celtics thrive on), but it exposes them to easier roll reads. Here’s the gamble Fernandez took in their last game: the Nets will live with whatever happens on the roll instead of letting the trigger-happy Celtics guards get easy three-point looks. Neemias Queta took that strategy and put it in the dirt.
In very typical Fernandez fashion, this scheme ratchets up the pressure on both teams. Queta has to roll into the right spot and receive a good pass from his guard. The Nets have to rotate properly to stop the roll, then cover the immediate passing options. Queta has to decide where to pass, and his teammates need to cut/relocate into space to help with his read. It’s a fragile chain of events for both sides and whoever executes on that chain of events will be at a big advantage.
Flare screens are a pet action for the Celtics. When you have a plethora of shooters and good screeners, it’s an easy way to generate threes and drives. Facing a Nets team that plays four rookies in the rotation, even your simplest actions can cause communication problems. Flare-based actions created all kinds of problems for Brooklyn in the last matchup.
Brooklyn is 29th in defensive rim attempt frequency and 21st in defensive rim FG% according to Cleaning the Glass. It doesn’t take much to break the paint against this team; Joe Mazzulla can lean on easy actions to drum up drives. Look for plenty of flare screens on Friday night.
The Nets have a problem with rim pressure on defense, but not as much on offense. Seven of their rotation players have rim rates at 50% or better this season. Perimeter prevention is important, but some of these Nets are going to get to the rim sooner than later. This is another pressure point for Neemias Queta, who needs to be his best rim-protecting self on Friday. Luckily for the Celtics, he was that guy in their November matchups.
Timely rotations and big blocks can hamstring a Nets offense that has been on life support recently. If Neem gets active early and deters them from venturing into his paint, that’ll go a long way towards the win.
I hope you feel a bit more prepared for this game. Now kick back and bask in some Celtics excellence.
