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Game 2 – Eastern Conference Finals
Boston is up 2-0 in the Eastern Conference Finals because of Jaylen Brown.
He hit the game-tying corner 3 in Game 1, which forced overtime and allowed the Celtics to scrape out a win. In Game 2 he picked up from there, coming out aggressive and dropping 40 points on the Pacers, sparking a dominant Celtics performance.
The Celtics took Game 2 126-110 and now take a 2-0 series lead to Indiana on Saturday night.
However, the big story may be whether Pacers All-Star Tyrese Haliburton can play in Game 3.
Haliburton left Game 2 with 3:44 remaining in the third quarter and walked straight back to the Pacers locker room, not to return. He has re-aggravated the hamstring issue that caused Haliburton to miss 10 games in January (and after which he was never quite the same player), Pacers coach Rick Carlisle confirmed postgame.
“We’ll know tomorrow and even more Saturday,” Carlisle said about whether Haliburton could return for Game 3.
Indiana was 7-7 in games Haliburton missed this season, but he is the engine of the Pacers’ up-tempo attack, and if he is out against a deep and elite Boston squad in the Eastern Conference Finals, it’s hard to see a path through for Indiana.
The Pacers struggled for stretches to score — and struggled with their defense all night — even when Haliburton was in the game.
What Brown and Boston did in Game 2 was be aggressive and get into the paint.
Boston averaged the lowest percentage of its points in the NBA during the regular season — because they launched more 3s than anyone — but in Game 2 the Celtics made a point of getting downhill and Indiana couldn’t stop them (Indiana gave up the most points in the paint this season).
It felt like this game was going to be decided at the start of the second quarter when the Celtics opened on a 17-0 run (it was 20-0 going back to the end of the first quarter) and pushed their lead out to 15. Brown stepped up and scored 24 points in the first half as he was the Celtic attacking off the dribble and trying to put his imprint on the game (Jayson Tatum had four points on 2-of-8 shooting in the first…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/jaylen-brown-sparks-dominating-celtics-030535713.html
Author : NBC Sports
Publish date : 2024-05-24 03:05:35
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