Jaylen Brown had five assists in the Celtics’ 124-90 romp against the Wizards on Sunday, but during a fourth-quarter timeout, with his night complete due to the lopsided score, he decided to pursue more.
As the Celtics hype squad fired white T-shirts into the stands, Brown grabbed the balled-up clothing and launched a few, too, with teammate Derrick White evaluating his throwing technique.
The playoffs are just two weeks away, so there will soon be tense, taut basketball games at TD Garden once again. But for now, the Celtics are all but locked into the No. 2 seed in the Eastern Conference playoffs and enjoying this brief chance to exhale.
Of course, the wins have continued to pile up during this relatively low-stress stretch. Boston has won 11 of 12 and needs to take just two of its last four to reach the 60-win mark for the second year in a row.
Although Sunday’s game had little big-picture meaning for either team, their interests were fairly aligned, even if Washington would never admit this.
The Celtics want to keep winning to maintain their momentum. And the Wizards have made it clear they are more focused on increasing their chances of winning next month’s draft lottery, which would position them to draft Duke superstar and Maine native Cooper Flagg.
So even if these goals were unspoken Sunday, both were accomplished during the Celtics’ wire-to-wire victory in which they led by as many as 16 points in the first quarter, 23 in the second, and 36 in the third.
“I feel like we’ve really moved the ball well and tried some different things out there and we’re playing a little more free,” forward Sam Hauser said. “Every game calls for something different, but I feel like lately we’ve been really trusting each other on that end of the floor, and defensively we’ve also tinkered with some stuff, and I feel like we’ve played pretty well.”
The night figured to at least give Celtics fans a chance to see one of the franchise’s most popular players of the past decade. Guard Marcus Smart was traded to the Grizzlies in June 2023, and Memphis traded Smart to the Wizards in February.
Sunday was set to be just Smart’s second appearance against Boston since his departure. He took part in pregame warmups, received a warm ovation when he was shown on the arena’s video board, and was active for the game. But he did not play.
Midway through the fourth quarter, chants of “We want Marcus” broke out. Moments later, Smart stood, turned, and had a verbal altercation with a fan behind the Wizards bench.
“[The fan] crossed the line, and we all know I don’t do line-crossing,” Smart said. “That was it. We move on. [It was] unfortunate. You never want to see that, especially for a guy who’s coming back, and who’s given the city everything he has, but it is what it is.”
A fan in that area was seen being escorted from the arena soon after that. Smart, meanwhile, returned to his seat as the supportive chants continued. After the game Smart greeted many of his former teammates near midcourt.
“The love is always there from both sides: myself and the fans, the city,” Smart said. “It’s definitely emotional coming back. You try to hold it back, but I love it. I love every last bit of it. I’m a part of the city. Nine years here, a kid to a young man, so it’s all love.”
The Celtics gobbled up a season-high 25 offensive rebounds Sunday and held a 62-32 overall edge on the glass.
Payton Pritchard scored a game-high 20 points and White added 19 to lead a balanced scoring attack. White connected on 5 of 9 3-pointers and has a franchise-record 258 this season. He has created some distance from Pritchard (246) and Jayson Tatum (243), who were recently well-positioned to challenge him for the record.
“Kind of just flying around,” White said. “There are so many different ways for us to attack teams. We’re just trying to create an advantage and then try to keep that advantage. People got it going and I think we did a really good job of hitting the offensive glass, which kind of created more open looks. That’s really where all my 3s came from, from second chances.”
Tatum (ankle) and Kristaps Porzingis (illness) both sat out for the Celtics, but Brown was once again in the lineup after being listed as questionable because of a lingering bone bruise in his right knee.
He scored 15 points in 22 minutes and appeared to be moving a bit better than he did in his previous two games, when he was seen limping and later acknowledged that he continues to deal with pain.
Last Wednesday Brown dismissed the suggestion that he was playing while injured in order to meet the 65-game threshold to be eligible for postseason awards. Still, that remains the most logical explanation. Brown will need to play in three of Boston’s final four contests to reach the 65-game mark.
Adam Himmelsbach can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him @adamhimmelsbach.
