NSL Insider - R1 Review: New York V Boston

by Rootsey, updated on Monday, May 22 2023, 12:14 am EST

Round 1 Review New York Knicks v Boston Celtics

Well game 1 made a promise of a series that would go down in in the annuls of NSL history, but the subsequent 3 games did not back up that promise. Whether that was tweaks to the line up in game 2 for the Cs or was it just Kawhi only played 27 minutes in a double overtime slobber knocker for the Knicks that let Boston make a fight of it. Lets take a dive into the series game by game to understand where it all went wrong for Boston and where it all went right for the Knicks who get to move on and take on the Wiz in the next round.

Game 1:

Now this was a game. Boston took the early lead in the game behind Jayson Tatum who had 10 of this 47 points in the first quarter and while the Knicks shared the scoring across the board. The Celtics took a 29-20 lead into the first break. Not surprisingly the Knicks bounced back, and they bounced back quick bringing it to within a point but the half time buzzer. Wiseman helped the Celtics keep the lead by pulling in 10 defensive rebounds by half time, he would go on to get 21 rebounds over the course of the game and adding 13 points to reach a solid double double. The Knicks run continued into the 3rd and they took the lead winning that quarter 26-21, making a 4 point margin with only a quarter of regular time in the game. Julius Randle was the key contributor in the 3rd, bagging 10 of his 23 in the 3rd alone. Celtics came into the 4th to try and win it away, and they took back the lead right in the last minute after a Tatum 3 with 31 seconds remaining. Down by 2 Derozan scores the tieing bucket with a full shot clock left. The game was in the hand of the Celtics to steal the first game of the series on the road. Tatum fires a shot with 2 seconds remaining and misses. Wiseman then grabs the offensive rebound but misses the follow up shot taking us to overtime.

Overtime kicks off and the Knicks grab the lead and hold it through to the final seconds of the period. With 6 seconds remaining we see Darius Garland, down by 1, fouling Marcus Smart and sending him to the line, hoping he misses a shot and gives the Celtics a chance to win it. Smart hits his first and extends the Knicks lead to 2. He misses his second and Wiseman brings in another rebound, Tatum hits a 2 and ties the game. Demar Derozan gets a last second shot to win it, but it misses. Second overtime on its way.

This time its back and forward, Knicks take the lead, Celtics take the lead, Knicks take the lead again but this time they don't let go, Smart hits both his free throws at 2:40 remaining to give the Knicks a 3 point lead and from there they extend it out to a 7 point victory. Tense moments for both teams, and signs of a massive series ahead. Both teams have scoring split amongst there stars, but Tatum with 47 has a massive game that just wasn't quite enough. Kawhi was a bit cold to start the game, but then was injured and sat after only playing 27 minutes.

Game 2:

People are excited that we have a great series on hand. Tatum had been shifted from Small Forward to avoid Kawhi, and Wiseman was shifted to power forward to bring Sengun into the starting line up and relegate the underperforming Biyombo but it wasn't enough to get the edge. Kawhi bounced back from injury with 32 poiints to lead all scorers.

From the tip Boston wanted this one. Again they take an early lead and then extends it at half to be up by 12. But they gave it all back in the 3rd and then some heading into the final quarter down by 4. By half way through the final stanza the Knicks grabbed a 10 point lead and would hold onto it for the rest of the game. We saw another good game from Randle (23 and 10) and the already mentioned Leonard.

Was this tactical change too much of a shift or was it a required adjustment as the first game was lucky to keep it close?

Game 3:

Knicks have cemented their winning formula so no changes when they are two games up, Boston have another tweak, Tatum back to small forward while retaining the big man line up from the second game. This change saw Wiseman lose his ability to get any rebounds, only bringing in 6, while Tatum picked up the slack getting 14 boards for himself. Randle and Leonard lead the charge for the Knicks. Smart should be given plenty of credit for hampering Garland all series, holding him to only 10 points for the game. The game came through with an 18 point margin to the Knicks, which was mostly done in the final quarter. Bench points hit their lowest ebb in the series in with Boston only getting 8 and Knicks getting 17.

Game 4:

The game 2 line up was used again for Boston but this was even less successful. The game was close at 12-11 early in the 1st quarter, where Boston held the lead, but this was the last time they would hold it, and the last time it even got close. Knicks ran away with it easily winning the final game by 28 points. Randle and Kawhi were the stars again and the bench got some extended play time to help bounce back from their low output the game before.

Series Stars:

Kawhi Leonard and Julius Randle were super solid all series putting up good numbers and helping the team make critical runs in the close games, to secure it for their team. Derozan had a few good games, but a few bad ones too.

Jayson Tatum was super consistant wherever he was asked to line up, but his supporting cast was much less consistant. Wiseman turned up on the boards for a few games, but Garland was nullified, while scoring 18 points in the regular season per game, he could only average 14 in the playoffs, they really needed a bit more out of him than what they got.

	LAC	105
	ORL	111

	LAL	122
	DEN	119

	NY	103
	UTAH	110

	CHI	108
	SA	97

	MEM	100
	SAC	113

NSL Insider - R1 Review: New York V Boston

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