Celtics (19-11) at TrailBlazers (12-19) Game #31 12/28/25

[Celtics2021]

White straight up lost us this game tonight. Awful game and especially decision-making from him.

I expect a big game from him vs Utah. This might have been his worst game as a Celtic?

I missed most of the game but White's stats don't indicate his worst game as a Celtic...12pts,5rebs,5assists,5steals,1 block, granted he missed a lot of 3s but the rest of his game on paper looks decent.

There was some simply awful decision-making on offense down the stretch by White.  He was responsible for three turnovers in the final two minutes and also took a rushed early shot clock 3 down by 1.

[Redz]

Yeh White can definitely look ugly and spacy sometimes.  Very weird to see him like that, but when he?s bad he?s BAD!

[Billz401]

White straight up lost us this game tonight. Awful game and especially decision-making from him.

I expect a big game from him vs Utah. This might have been his worst game as a Celtic?

I missed most of the game but White's stats don't indicate his worst game as a Celtic...12pts,5rebs,5assists,5steals,1 block, granted he missed a lot of 3s but the rest of his game on paper looks decent.

There was some simply awful decision-making on offense down the stretch by White.  He was responsible for three turnovers in the final two minutes and also took a rushed early shot clock 3 down by 1.

He took some straight up dumb shots in the 1st half too

[Goldstar88]

JB with 6 turnovers didn?t help..

[Celtics2021]

JB with 6 turnovers didn?t help..

Sure, but at least one of those was on White for bent a double-team to Jaylen at mid-court, and another was the Scott Foster special charging flagrant.

[Roy H.]

JB with 6 turnovers didn?t help..

JB wouldn't be the 1st -/ or 5th -- guy I blamed tonight.

[radiohead]

White straight up lost us this game tonight. Awful game and especially decision-making from him.

I expect a big game from him vs Utah. This might have been his worst game as a Celtic?

I missed most of the game but White's stats don't indicate his worst game as a Celtic...12pts,5rebs,5assists,5steals,1 block, granted he missed a lot of 3s but the rest of his game on paper looks decent.

Sorry got carried away with my statement. Agree it?s not his worst game stats wise, but his turnovers in the fourth quarter were really uncharacteristic of him. Just a weird game for DW.

[Celtics4ever]

You could tell we were going to lose at the beginning. They were hot and we could not put them away. Clingan looked like Wilt out there.  A lot of our guys got in early foul trouble and could not defend like normal.   The great effort was not consistent with all our guys playing. 

Classic Trap game.

[boscel33]

You could tell we were going to lose at the beginning. They were hot and we could not put them away. Clingan looked like Wilt out there.  A lot of our guys got in early foul trouble and could not defend like normal.   The great effort was not consistent with all our guys playing. 

Classic Trap game.

Clingan should look like Wilt against the C's, Queta and Garza ain't stopping him and at one point, Hugo was trying to box him out.  No, this game was lost with the continuation of chucking threes when they're not falling, 13/44 for 29.5% (and the 20 TO's).  This is where I don't like Joe as a coach, he has to see that and pivot but it's not in his mindset.  Someone will also have to explain to me the rotation.  How does Walsh get only ten minutes?  Look, I think Hugo is going to be great, and I've been bashing Walsh for years (along with Baylor), but recently, Walsh has been proving me wrong.  This is the classic game that causes coaches to lose their jobs!  BTW, we get to see Kyle Filipowski in the next game.  Maybe we could have Baylor guard him.

[Celtics2021]

You could tell we were going to lose at the beginning. They were hot and we could not put them away. Clingan looked like Wilt out there.  A lot of our guys got in early foul trouble and could not defend like normal.   The great effort was not consistent with all our guys playing. 

Classic Trap game.

Clingan should look like Wilt against the C's, Queta and Garza ain't stopping him and at one point, Hugo was trying to box him out.  No, this game was lost with the continuation of chucking threes when they're not falling, 13/44 for 29.5% (and the 20 TO's).  This is where I don't like Joe as a coach, he has to see that and pivot but it's not in his mindset.  Someone will also have to explain to me the rotation.  How does Walsh get only ten minutes?  Look, I think Hugo is going to be great, and I've been bashing Walsh for years (along with Baylor), but recently, Walsh has been proving me wrong.  This is the classic game that causes coaches to lose their jobs!  BTW, we get to see Kyle Filipowski in the next game.  Maybe we could have Baylor guard him.

Walsh got 10 minutes because he picked up 3 fouls in the first 4.5 minutes of the game and the team was outscored by 8 points in his 5 minutes early in the second half.

[Phantom255x]

White had a really bad game and choked down the stretch too.

But I agree with the others, this is what worries me. When the 3s aren't falling, what's the solution and what are the adjustments? Because the scary thing is, this philosophy lost us the Knicks series last year and I'm still not sure if they understand that yet. They've lost games this season too where they shot poorly from 3 but kept jacking them up. We choked those 20 point leads vs. the Knicks partly because we went ice cold from 3 and couldn't keep the lead up because that's all we tried to do.

That part isn't a roster issue (even though yes we definitely need another center), in fact a lot of our guys are capable of generating easy 2s (Jaylen, PP, etc.) but living and dying by the 3 is going to cost this team again if they don't adjust. Not that I'm expecting this team to reach the Finals or anything that extreme, but even an early playoff round if you shoot 3s and they don't fall, the other team could win that series.

[Vermont Green]

For +/-, Simons and Garza were bad.  Walsh was +0 in his 10 minutes, all with the starters.  5 fouls and 3 Turnovers in that 10 minutes.  Garza and Simons were on the floor together for 9 minutes and managed a -11 with 5 turnovers and 6 fouls.

I did not see the game, but see some posts that they were double teaming Brown.  Teams haven't been doubling Brown all that much, at least in the games I have seen.  This may be something we see more of.

[smicker16]

White had a really bad game and choked down the stretch too.

But I agree with the others, this is what worries me. When the 3s aren't falling, what's the solution and what are the adjustments? Because the scary thing is, this philosophy lost us the Knicks series last year and I'm still not sure if they understand that yet. They've lost games this season too where they shot poorly from 3 but kept jacking them up. We choked those 20 point leads vs. the Knicks partly because we went ice cold from 3 and couldn't keep the lead up because that's all we tried to do.

That part isn't a roster issue (even though yes we definitely need another center), in fact a lot of our guys are capable of generating easy 2s (Jaylen, PP, etc.) but living and dying by the 3 is going to cost this team again if they don't adjust. Not that I'm expecting this team to reach the Finals or anything that extreme, but even an early playoff round if you shoot 3s and they don't fall, the other team could win that series.

I actually disagree about the roster aspect you mention here. Last year absolutely it was crazy how much settling we did with the offensive fire power of Tatum Brown Holiday and White alone. But this year we basically have a bunch of catch and shoot guys and then Brown and White. Pritchard still struggled against physical and long defenders. Portland was aggressive against those guys and White settled a ton. The only person who could create anything in that game was Brown and he took 18 2s. Not sure what more you could ask but I think this game is a clear showcase that we don?t really have many shot creators at all and mainly a lot of catch and shoot players that results in a lot of 3s even though Portland still took more on less shots.

The other thing in this game is that it was one of the first times I feel I have seen a team really ignore some of those catch and shoot guys.  They were daring Hugo and Garza to beat them from
 3 and eventually they do have to take some of those. That led to the pain being packed for most of the night. That is just my take on this. I agree with how people felt last year but this year this is about what I expected with this roster.