Ime Udoka needs to make changes in wake of Celtics disastrous loss to Blazers | Brian Robb - masslive.com

Ime Udoka needs to make changes in wake of Celtics disastrous loss to Blazers | Brian Robb

Ime Udoka

Boston Celtics coach Ime Udoka gestures during the first half of the team's NBA basketball game against the New York Knicks on Thursday, Jan. 6, 2022, in New York. (AP Photo/Adam Hunger)AP

The Celtics have had more than a handful of ugly collapses during the 2021-22 season but things reached a new low on Friday night at TD Garden. Boston was playing at close to full strength (no Marcus Smart) against a bad Blazers team playing without their All-Star point guard Damian Lillard.

Much like the season, the play was inconsistent for Boston all much of the night as the team allowed 75 percent shooting in the first quarter to fall behind by as many as 15 in the first half. However, the hosts rallied back in what became a seesaw affair before the start of the fourth quarter. From late in the third quarter, Ime Udoka found success with a lineup featuring a host of shooters surrounding Jayson Tatum (Romeo Langford, Payton Pritchard, Al Horford, Grant Williams) and that group found themselves up 11 with 7:19 remaining in the fourth quarter.

From there, disaster ensued on the offensive end. Boston missed their final 10 field goal attempts of the game, failing to score for six-plus minutes in one stretch as Portland with Jaylen Brown leading the way in shot attempts. Here’s the full breakdown

Jaylen Brown: 0/4

Jayson Tatum: 0/2

Grant Williams: 0/2

Romeo Langford: 0/1

Rob Williams: 0/1

The Celtics fought back to take the lead on multiple occasions in the final minute following free throws from Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum but both All-Stars made egregious decisions that haunted the Celtics in the final minute. First, Brown overhelped on a drive and lost Robert Covington, an absolute no-no with Boston holding a two-point lead at the time. Covington drilled the open corner 3, allowing the Blazers to take the lead.

Thirty seconds later and facing a one-point deficit, Jayson Tatum attempted an open stepback game-winning 3 that missed badly, capping a perimeter shooting slump where he has misfired on 20 straight attempts from 3-point range over three games.

Brown’s defensive gaffe and poor shooting along with Tatum’s questionable shot selection late (going to the rim or swinging to an open Jaylen Brown or Dennis Schroder on the weak side were options) deserves focus after the loss. However, the fact remains that Boston shouldn’t have been in this situation in the first place.

Ime Udoka’s tactical decisions repeatedly left Boston in tough spots over the course of 48 minutes and came back to haunt Boston in the 109-105 loss. A closer look at the issues and why changes are necessary if this group wants to turn the corner and salvage their season ahead of a potential sell-off at the Feb. 10 trade deadline.

The center rotation and a starting shift: Udoka began the year electing to go with a double big look in the frontcourt with Al Horford and Rob Williams and that original starting five lineup has some good numbers together. However, the Celtics roster at this point really needs to play one of Horford and R. Williams for 48 minutes per night at center. Enes Freedom has had some positive moments this season but he’s been giving Boston close to nothing off the bench for a few weeks now. Udoka mercifully pulled the plug on Freedom after a three minute stint in the second quarter against Portland but not before the Blazers jumped out a 7-0 run to begin the second quarter, building a double-digit lead in the process.

Boston could certainly use some big man depth to provide as an alternative to Freedom’s defensive issues but that player has not been acquired yet (and isn’t Bruno Fernando). So what’s the fix here? Bringing Horford off the bench and starting Grant Williams is a simple fix that solves the problem. Horford and Rob Williams can share all 48 minutes at center in this scenario while G. Williams provides some needed floor spacing for the start group with his 42 percent shooting from 3-point range.

Starting Horford and R. Williams together make it tough to pull off this type of rotation but the tweak is needed after seeing Freedom fail to provide any type of resistance in his stints for a team that is supposed to be built on defense. Udoka needs to start soaring with his strengths on this front and make the adjustments to give this unit a more complete look for a full 48 minutes rather than only going to the two at center out of desperation (i.e. the second half against Blazers).

Questionable crunch time choices: Boston saw a lot of success with Tatum at point guard and plenty of shooting around him for large portions of the second half on Friday night. However, as crunch time hit, Portland made a decision that they weren’t going to let Tatum beat them, throwing double teams at him and zoning up plenty against the Celtics late.

“They obviously went after Jayson, took him out a little bit there, blitzing and throwing double teams at him when they did switch,” Udoka said. And we weren’t as crisp, had some turnovers but also missed some open shots that obviously would change the game if we hit those.”

With Tatum playing nearly the entire second half on his way to game-high 41 minutes, it’s fair to surmise that some added ball handling support would have come in handy for Boston in the fourth quarter. However, Udoka bizarrely elected to stay away from any other reliable ball handlers in crunch time outside of the All-Star. He brought back in Rob Williams for Al Horford around the four-minute mark, a particularly useful player against a zone who had been playing well but his minutes had gotten high (due to starting the half at power forward).

Udoka also stuck with Romeo Langford over a pair of guards Payton Pritchard and Dennis Schroder for the vast majority of crunch time. Langford played one of his best games of the season but he’s not a reliable creator or secondary ball handler at this stage of his career.

“The unit was rolling well,” Udoka said of playing no point guards late. “We liked Jayson with the ball in his hands. He was playing well there. And it was a defensive thing as well. They had some size that was hurting us. Didn’t love how Nurkic was hurting us inside, wanted more rebounding there. And like I said, that group was playing well. We obviously built a lead up to 11 so we rolled with it.”

The problem with that mindset for Udoka is that the unit that did well early in the fourth had a point guard playing (Pritchard) within it. The scoring slump came once Pritchard was subbed out of the game with just over five minutes left.

As things went south for Boston, Udoka bizarrely stuck with this lineup for the vast majority of crunch time, only subbing in Schroder briefly for a couple of offensive possessions in the final minute. However, by then, the damage was done with Boston’s lead erased. The Celtics went scoreless for six-plus minutes amid a mix of missed 3s, turnovers and poor offensive possessions on their way to five points in the final 7:18.

Having Marcus Smart certainly would have helped in this spot but going from playing too many point guards (Schroder and Smart) in crunch time to zero was not the answer Friday night for Udoka. Sticking with Langford and R. Williams at first was defensible but when the offense continuously went nowhere (Brown was particularly bad in this stretch) for several possessions, bringing in a point guard or even a facilitator in Horford could have helped to stop the bleeding and helped the C’s some more consistent quality looks before things got tight late. Instead, the Blazers closed the gap with an 12-0 run, setting the stage for a nip-and-tuck final minute that went against Boston.

Final Thoughts

Unfortunately for Udoka, Friday’s game was far from an isolated incident. Much like this roster, he’s struggled at times all year in these spots, which is understandable for a rookie head coach. To his credit, he took some accountability for the team’s offensive woes after the game but actions need to start speaking louder than words for him. The Celtics have a flawed roster but they are continuously failing in big spots and questionable choices from the head coach continue to factor in. Some simple changes could go a long way to getting Boston back on track and salvaging a season that could slip away in the coming weeks.

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