The Celtics filled the hole in their defense

In the wake of a franchise-altering Jaylen Brown trade, Brad Stevens spent the majority of his press conference hammering home the idea of optionality as a key to their path forward. The team has choices without locking themselves into any direction.

It’s hard to remove the emotions from this trade, but leaning on one of Stevens’ other favorite sayings, we can start to see things from a 10,000-foot view. From a higher altitude, the vision for Boston next season becomes more appealing.

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As currently constructed, they have the makings of a great team, and most importantly, an elite defensive unit.

Last season, they fared well on that end with the 4th best defensive rating (111.7). They consistently found the right recipe to succeed, usually by dictating where other teams’ offense came from.

Looking at their opponents shot diet, just 20.8% of shots came at the rim, the best in the NBA by a decent margin. Similarly, they managed to push teams toward mid-range attempts. These factors contributed to them suppressing their opponents’ efficiency. They held teams to the third lowest true shooting percentage behind the Thunder and Spurs.

There was one hole in an otherwise strong defense.

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The Celtics ranked 29th in opponent turnovers, and 29th in dTOV, which quantifies the amount of defensive net rating attributed to forcing opponent turnovers versus league average. Live-ball takeaways weren’t part of their formula, and their hands matched that, too. Boston ranked 6th lowest in deflections during the regular season, and the number cratered further in the playoffs, where they averaged the fewest in the league at 10 per game.

The absence of takeaways showed up on the other end of the floor as well. Boston had the fewest transition possessions per game in the league, and ranked 25th in points off turnovers. Without forcing live-ball mistakes, they miss out on chances for easy offense.

They still finished with the fourth-best defense in the league despite rarely forcing turnovers.

Of the three teams with better defensive ratings, the Pistons and Thunder ranked first and second in the league at generating…

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Publish date : 2026-07-12 09:38:00

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