LA Lakers star Anthony Davis breaks down what his team did to beat the Boston Celtics at their own game.
In the modern era, every NBA team is taking more three-point shots than ever. That includes the Joe Mazzulla-led Boston Celtics.
Considering the Celtics are currently the defending champions of the NBA, Mazzulla’s strategy seems to be working.
However, the C’s were given a reality check by the Los Angeles Lakers with a 117-96 defeat at the Crypto.com Arena.
To put things into perspective, the Celtics currently lead the league in three-point shot attempts per game.
At the time of writing, they average 48.9 three-point shots per game. Now, that’s a lot. On the other hand, the Purple and Gold rank 24th on the list with 33.8 three-point shots per game.
However, the Lakers perfectly countered that aspect of the game in their recent matchup. For starters, they attempted 41 shots from distance and managed to make just 14 of them.
On the other hand, the Lakers attempted 35 three-pointers, nailing 15 of them. It was a huge difference maker in the game’s result.
But how did the Lakers beat the Celtics at their own game?
Lakers superstar Anthony Davis is one of the best defenders in the league right now. AD talked about stopping the Celtics from three during the postgame on-court interview.
“Make them put it on the floor. They shoot very well when they can catch and shoot, but it drops significantly when they’ve got to put it on the floor.
“So, that was our game plan, ‘Don’t let them catch and shoot,’” Davis said.
Apart from holding the Celtics to a low 3P%, the Lakers also needed to be better than their rivals.
Davis briefly explained that the team did so by getting the better of Celtics two key defenders – Jrue Holiday and Kristaps Porzingis.
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