Boston’s defense vs. Golden State’s offense was the highly anticipated heavyweight fight basketball fans couldn’t wait to see heading into these NBA Finals. But in Game 1, the Celtics’ scoring onslaught stole the show.
Boston generated 129 points per 100 possessions, a mark topped only once in their playoff run (Game 2 against the Heat), and in just 11 games throughout the entire regular season. They shared the ball (an exceptional 76.7% of their field goals were assisted, trailing only what they posted in Game 7 against the Bucks), nearly half of all their shots were threes and over half of them went in—which only happened five times this season.
Now, the question for Steve Kerr, Draymond Green and Co. is should they execute the same strategy and hope Boston goes cold, or tweak their game plan and pay more attention to the outside (which is what the Celtics did after they lost Game 1 of their second-round series against the Bucks).
