BOSTON — Late in the fourth quarter of the Celtics 102-94 win over the Portland Trail Blazers, Payton Pritchard crouched down in pain on the TD Garden parquet and clutched his left hand. Moments later, the Celtics guard headed into the locker room, his injury status seemingly up in the air.
But, much to the relief of the Celtics fans who braved the winter storm to watch Jrue Holiday and Rob Williams make their triumphant returns, Pritchard returned just a few minutes later and closed out the final 42 seconds of the ball game. The Celtics put away the Blazers, and improved to 29-17 on the season — the Eastern Conference’s second-best record.
Afterwards, Pritchard revealed that the injury was nothing too concerning; he simply re-injured a pinky finger that’s been bothering him for the past month.
“I’ve been dealing with it, jamming it back and forth, and then he just kind of hit it,” Pritchard said, explaining his finger turned sideways.
Pritchard said he thinks he first hurt his finger when the Celtics faced the Trail Blazers on December 28th. But it’s not something that’s put him on the injury report; he’s only missed one game in January, and that was due to listed ankle soreness.
“When you play basketball, you deal with finger injuries,” Pritchard said.
Payton Pritchard put together another strong showing vs the Blazers
On Monday, Pritchard beat both the end-of-first-quarter and halftime buzzers, while tallying 23 points on 8-16 FG, 4 rebounds, and 3 assists.
The finger injury doesn’t appear to have slowed down his production. This year, Pritchard is averaging 16.8 points while shooting 45.1% from the field and 34.7% from three-point range.
In January, his counting stats have slightly decreased, but his efficiency has improved; he’s averaging 15.9 points and shooting 46.6% from the field and 39.4% from three-point range. All season long, Pritchard has had one of the best assist-to-turnover ratios in the NBA; he’s averaging 5.3 assists and 1.1 turnovers per game.
After the win over the Blazers, Pritchard said the discussions around the Celtics taking a step back this season were motivating.
“People have been doubting me my whole life,” he said. “For me, it’s like show up, go to work, figure out how to win games — and prove people wrong. So, nothing changed for me in my mindset.”
