The Boston Celtics and Washington Wizards are set to face off against each other in the NBA’s first play-in game this year. Boston will be short-handed with Jaylen Brown sidelined. Meanwhile, Bradley Beal has been playing through a hamstring injury that has noticeably impacted him.
All of the momentum appears to be in the Wizards’ favor entering this matchup despite Beal’s injury. Washington is coming off a pivotal 115-110 victory over the Charlotte Hornets, which ultimately helped them go from No. 10 to No. 8 in the Eastern Conference standings before the play-in tournament.
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The Celtics ended up coming up short 96-92 to the New York Knicks in their regular season finale. Boston has also lost five of their previous six games prior to taking on the Wizards.
One NBA scout spoke to NBA Analysis Network about the play-in matchup and weighed in with his thoughts. He started with the Wizards’ perspective on the game and them moved to the Celtics’ side of things.
“Bradley Beal looks noticeably impacted by his hamstring injury and it’s unclear if he’s going to be able to shoulder the Wizards offensively like he usually does. It will help that he doesn’t have to matchup against Jaylen Brown with him being sidelined, but the Celtics do have Marcus Smart they can turn to.”
“This is going to have to be one of those games where Russell Westbrook takes over and out-wills the Celtics to a win. Nobody is going to stay in front of someone with Westbrook’s explosiveness, but if there is someone that can, it’s definitely not Kemba Walker. Boston doesn’t have the rim protection or team defense to deter Westbrook, so he needs to take full advantage of that.”
“Jaylen Brown played a big role for the Celtics in previous matchups with the Wizards this season. Not having him in the lineup will make Boston a less layered half-court attack. Keeping pace with Beal and Westbrook won’t be possible unless Kemba Walker steps up in a major way.”
“Jayson Tatum likes to take tough shots and if those are not falling, the Celtics are in trouble…simple as that. He should look to get to the rim against a soft Wizards’ interior defense to avoid having to rely on turnaround jump shots and step-back three’s. He has shown the ability to go for 60 playing his game, but Washington’s defense doesn’t require that to get the job done.”
It appears as though a lot will be riding on the performance of Russell Westbrook and Jayson Tatum when considering the circumstances. This is what makes the concept of the NBA play-in tournament so great. Two high-level stars face a situation where their team has its back against the wall and they need to elevate their game in order to lead their team to a victory.
The winner of this matchup wins the grand prize of having to take on the Brooklyn Nets in the first-round of the playoffs instead of having to take on the top-seed Philadelphia 76ers. Neither team has an interior presence to be able to handle Joel Embiid or stop Ben Simmons from getting to the rim, but nobody has the capability to contain a three-headed monster like Kevin Durant, James Harden, and Kyrie Irving either.
It will be fascinating to see how limited Bradley Beal ends up being with his hamstring injury. If he’s unable to play up to his usual standard, Russell Westbrook would face a potential situation where he faces his former superstar teammate in Kevin Durant head-to-head. As for Jayson Tatum, he’d have to lead his Celtics team in an uphill inner-division battle against three superstars.
