The Boston Celtics and New York Knicks opened the season with a double-overtime classic. The Celtics had their chances to win that tightly contested affair but couldn’t capitalize down the stretch and it proved to be costly. They had an opportunity to avenge that tough loss on Saturday night against the Knicks and they did just that.
The Celtics offense came in the form of a three-pronged attack with Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown, and Josh Richardson.
Richardson led the Celtics in scoring on a very efficient 27 points. Tatum added 25 points himself and grabbed a game-high nine rebounds. Brown did a little bit of everything, scoring 23 points, grabbing four rebounds, and dishing out five assists.
Payton Pritchard also had a solid outing scoring 16 points and knocking down four three-pointers off the bench.
The Knicks made a strong second half comeback behind the performances of two former Celtics, Kemba Walker and Evan Fournier. Walker scored 29 points in his first game back after being cut out of the rotation and Fournier’s scored a game-high 32 points. Fournier’s two best scoring performances of the season came against the Celtics, go figure.
After a big third quarter push by the Knicks, the Celtics responded in the fourth quarter. They outscored the Knicks 28-19 in the quarter and ended up with a 114-107 victory.
These teams will meet two more time this season and their final two meetings will be played back-to-back on January 6th and 8th.