In a late afternoon primetime matchup against Milwaukee, the hosting Celtics got revenge for an early season beatdown versus the Giannis-less Bucks in a 107-79 win on Sunday.
The game was the inaugural Pioneers Classic, a now annual game on February 1 that kicks off Black History Month by honoring the league’s first Black players: Chuck Cooper, Nat Clifton, and Earl Lloyd.
The Celtics (31-18) were led by Jaylen Brown with 30 points (12/20 FG) and 13 rebounds, while the Bucks (18-29) were led by Ryan Rollins’ 25 points. Anfernee Simons also added an efficient 27 points off the bench (10/18 FG) while Derrick White finished with a well-rounded statline of 17 points, 7 rebounds and 8 assists.
The first quarter immediately favored the Bucks out of the gate, with Milwaukee jumping out to a 12-0 lead. Boston missed its first four shots until Jaylen Brown hit a 3-pointer from the corner to break the game-opening drought.
Ryan Rollins hit his first four shots during Milwaukee’s hot start, but the Celtics responded out of a timeout to close the gap down to five after a pair of threes from Derrick White and layups from Neemias Queta made it an 18-13 Bucks lead.
The Celtics fought their way back through perimeter shooting and points off turnovers, riding the hot hand of Anfernee Simons, who drilled a trio of 3-pointers, including a buzzer-beater to send Boston and Milwaukee into the second quarter knotted up at 26-26.
Boston took its first lead of the game on the opening possession of the second quarter, when Payton Pritchard nailed a three for a 29-26 advantage. Boston proceeded to hold the lead for the entirety of the quarter, getting a team-best seven points from Pritchard and a well-rounded four points, two rebounds and three assists from Jordan Walsh to take a 56-42 lead into halftime.
The Celtics ended the half on a 14-2 run to bring their lead into double figures, with White scoring back-to-back buckets and Brown closing out the quarter with an acrobatic finish at the rim for a 14-point lead. Simons’ 14 points off four 3-pointers led the team in the first half.
To open the third quarter, the Celtics were quick to attack the mid-range, making three straight shots from that area of the floor, two from Brown and another from White, to force an early Bucks timeout down 62-47. Immediately out of the timeout, Brown found his spot in the short mid-range again, this time finishing through the foul for a 3-point play and an 18-point Celtics lead. He extended his range to the 3-point line on the next possession, burying a pull-up triple to force another Bucks timeout with the lead now at 21.
While the Celtics maintained a lead over 20, the Bucks endured a brutal shooting stretch, missing seven straight shots in the middle of the third quarter. The Bucks were able to chip away from the free throw line however, converting on eight of their 11 attempts in the quarter while Boston endured its own cold stretch that got the deficit down to as low as 13 points.
Boston recovered in the final minutes of the third, when Simons broke the drought with a slash to the rim, and Walsh drove past Pete Nance for a bucket through contact that helped Boston take a 78-61 lead into the fourth quarter.
A 10-2 run to open the fourth quarter got the Celtics up by 25, and White came out firing with a quick five points and three assists to lead the way. When Brown checked in after a timeout, he added a quick 10 points of his own to keep Boston comfortably in front, finishing his night with less than four minutes left in the game. Brown nailed four of his five shots in less than three minutes.
Boston’s next game will also be nationally televised on NBC and Peacock, when the Celtics travel to American Airlines Center for a matchup against the Dallas Mavericks on Tuesday, February 3 at 8 p.m.
