The Boston Celtics are legitimate contenders.
It’s OK to say that out loud. That doesn’t mean they’re going to raise Banner 18. Heck, this team might not even get out of the first round of the Eastern Conference playoffs because of the hole it dug with its late-game struggles early in the year and the less-than-ideal matchups the jumbled standings might produce.
But we now have a two-plus month sample size in which the Celtics' defense hasn’t just been good, it’s been elite. And that alone gives this team a chance to win every single time it steps on the court, regardless of the opponent.
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Since the calendar flipped to 2022, the Celtics own a defensive rating of 100.4 in a 23-game span. That’s more than a quarter of the season. The nearest rival is basically 4 points worse (Dallas, 104.2). The Phoenix Suns, who are an NBA best 20-2 in the new calendar year, are third in defensive rating in that span but are giving up 6.5 points per 100 possessions more than Boston.
Since October 27, the Celtics have the best defense in the league. That’s a 55-game sample in which they’ve held opponents to a league-low 104.4 points per 100 possessions. Boston sits second for the entirety of the season but will eventually sneak in front of the Golden State Warriors.
Ime Udoka deserves credit for enduring the early season bumps, calling his team out for those lapses, and eventually getting his crew to buy in on that end. The Celtics were impossibly bad out of the gates and you could practically see them overthinking every switch and each rotation, which they were inevitably a split-second late on. Udoka smoothed out the wrinkles, adjusted to maximize his personnel’s talent, and the Celtics have been every bit the defensive juggernaut that first-year president of basketball operations Brad Stevens hoped when he assembled the coaching staff and roster this past summer.
"I think that the team has done a really good job of identifying where they can maximize their strengths on that end," said Stevens. "The players and the coaches have done a good job of that. And then the players have done a really good job of buying in and having fun and playing the right way and flying around covering for one another and making it something that I think they look forward to playing on that end.
"That's not every team that you've ever coached. We've had some really good defensive teams here. I just think we have more answers.”
Gone are the small guards that opponents once targeted. The Celtics found the right mix of talent and can go big to start games with Al Horford freeing up Robert Williams to create havoc, then shift small in crunch time. Boston now trots out a top seven in which there are no weak defensive links after Stevens leaned further into defense at the trade deadline by adding Derrick White and Daniel Theis.
Now, even on a night when Robert Williams is battling calf tightness and Marcus Smart limps off after rolling his ankle, the Celtics can maintain a high level of defensive play.
When the offense makes a franchise record 25 3-pointers, the result is an impossibly lopsided win over a team ahead of them in the standings. Boston’s offense is still prone to maddening lulls and there are going to be nights when they go ice cold and the defense isn’t enough to save them.
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But the Celtics have an identity now with their defense. So if this team can stay healthy, and if Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown get hot when the playoffs roll around, the Celtics can hang with anybody.
The natural protest is that Boston has feasted on inferior competition recently. No doubt, the Celtics’ advanced numbers are juiced from a string of lopsided wins. Here’s the thing: That’s what good teams are supposed to do. Over the course of the season, there are going to be a bunch of close games that tip one way or another but the reason that point differential so frequently identifies true contenders is because it showcases just how often a team actually imposes its dominance on opponents.
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The Celtics have been a wrecking ball lately and shouldn’t apologize for the strength of schedule.
Boston is up to plus-5.2 in point differential, per Cleaning the Glass data that standardizes to per-100 possessions. That’s the fifth-best number in the NBA and second best in the East behind only Miami (plus-5.3). Go by the more basic points-per-game value and Boston’s differential spikes to an East-best plus-5.5, a full point ahead of the Heat (they’d be fourth overall in the NBA behind the Suns, Jazz, and Warriors overall).
ESPN’s Basketball Power Index has the Celtics with easily the best defensive marks in the NBA and the second best ranking overall behind the Suns. Boston’s offense is middle of the pack at best, but its defense distinguishes this team.
The encouraging part is that Boston’s offense has made strides lately, too. The ball movement is much improved -- another focal point for Udoka. The Celtics have been able to survive clunkers from Brown and Tatum, something that rarely happened at the start of the year.
But anything Boston accomplishes in the postseason will almost certainly hinge on its ability to maintain the defensive impact we’ve seen lately.
"I've coached a lot of defenses in my life, coached some really good ones in college and some really good ones here,” said Stevens. “And I've never seen one this dynamic when it's locked in.”
The Celtics have to hope that Smart’s ankle isn’t a long-term concern and that Williams can stay healthy when it matters most. Because this defense is fun to watch when its at full health.
In seven games in the month of February, the Celtics are allowing an absurd 94.7 points per 100 possessions. The next closest team is the undefeated Utah Jazz (6-0 in February) at 103.7.
It’s absolutely fair to be skeptical about Boston’s overall ceiling. The team is running with an eight-man rotation and injuries could complicate matters in a hurry. The offense desperately needs Tatum and Brown to play well to beat elite competition. But the numbers simply don’t lie.
Boston’s defense makes this team a legitimate contender.