Next man up continues to be the motto for the Boston Celtics as they claimed a 117-101 game one victory over the Philadelphia 76ers Monday.
The Celtics seemed to be in the driver’s seat from start to finish despite playing without Jaylen Brown, who suffered a hamstring injury in game seven against the Bucks. After a tightly fought opening frame, every quarter ended in at least an 11 point lead for Boston.
Joel Embiid nailed a three-pointer to put his team within single digits with under seven minutes to play in the game, but back-to-back threes from Al Horford and Terry Rozier extended the lead back to 13. Starting at the 4:21 mark, Jayson Tatum scored seven straight points to put game one out of reach.
Poor shooting by Philadelphia combined with stingy defense by Boston held the Sixers—a normally dangerous shooting team—to an appalling 19.2 percent clip from behind the arc. Brett Brown’s squad left plenty of points on the table as they only converted on 26-of-35 attempts from the charity stripe.
Meanwhile, the Celtics shot 48.6 percent from deep and 48.2 percent from the field. They also were effective on their free throws—only missing one try out of 19.
Although Embiid and the 76ers won the rebounding battle, Boston made up for it by protecting the ball well and playing unselfishly. Boston finished the night with just 10 turnovers and notched 27 assists.
Even in a losing effort, Embiid demonstrated the damage he is capable of doing throughout this series. The 7-foot center led all players in points with 31 and rebounds with 13.
His counterpart of “The Process”, Ben Simmons, had a nice game but was overall contained by Boston’s defense. The 21-year-old prodigy ended up with 18 points, seven rebounds, and six assists.
Horford was extremely efficient, shooting 10-for-12 from the field. He was one of three Celtics to hit the 26-point mark and snagged seven rebounds.
Tatum joined Horford on the list of 20 point scorers in game one. The 20-year-old had a rough night from distance making just one of five attempts, but still found a way to finish with a postseason career-high 28 points.
Rozier, once again, proved how incredible he can be. He led the Celtics in both points and rebounds, all while making two more threes than the entire 76ers squad. The Louisville product poured in 29 points, eight rebounds, and six assists.
This victory puts the Celtics at 5-0 in front of their home crowd this postseason. They will try to remain undefeated at the TD Garden during game two on Thursday, May 3, with tipoff set for 8:30 p.m.
