But the Celtics willingly and methodically disposed of the roster that was placed in front of them, roaring to a 29-point first-half lead before cruising to a 126-105 win, their fourth in a row.
“I thought we were the harder-playing team right from the jump,” Sam Hauser said. “Obviously we got off to a great start and maintained that.”
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Jaylen Brown had 30 points, 8 rebounds, and 8 assists to lead the Celtics, who buried Los Angeles with another flammable shooting night. Boston made 46 of 84 shots overall, and 24 of 45 3-pointers (53.3 percent).
The Celtics failed to reach the 40-percent mark from the 3-point line in their first 12 games of the season, and their 5-7 record was a direct result of that. During that grisly shooting stretch, coach Joe Mazzulla insisted that the poor numbers were more due to shooting misfortune than shoddy execution.
On Friday, he acknowledged that the shooting luck might have tilted in the opposite direction. He was still pleased with the overall approach.
“I thought we had great execution,” he said. “I liked the shots we got.”
Derrick White was able to elude the long arm of the Lakers’ Rui Hachimura during this drive in the first half. Barry Chin/Globe Staff
The Celtics are averaging 121.9 points per 100 possessions, tied for the second-best offensive rating in the NBA. Following all of the notable departures this summer as well as Jayson Tatum’s absence because of his Achilles injury, this level of production would have seemed unfathomable at the start of the year.
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Despite these gaudy numbers, guard Payton Pritchard does not think the offense has reached its peak. He said it’ll “be exciting” to continue the ascension.
“If everybody’s just focused on, ‘How can I just get a little bit better each day, each game, no matter win or loss?,’ ” Pritchard said, “then eventually we’ll become the team we want to become.”
Jordan Walsh followed his strong game Thursday against the Wizards by making 6 of 7 shots and scoring 17 points Friday. He is 18 for 19 from the field over the last three games, and his rise since joining the starting lineup has been Boston’s most encouraging development.
Austin Reaves had 36 points to lead Los Angeles, but the Celtics mostly bottled him up during the first half, when he was just 2 for 7 from the field and his team stumbled into a deep hole.
Surprisingly, some of the night’s loudest cheers were reserved for James’s son, Bronny, the second-year guard. Following scattered “we want Bronny” chants during the second half, he checked in to some applause midway through the fourth. The crowd erupted when Bronny had a one-handed dunk and a 3-pointer, although the lopsided score probably factored into the warm reaction.
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With the game out of hand in the Celtics’ favor, Lakers guard Bronny James (9) saw some action during the fourth quarter Friday. Barry Chin/Globe Staff
Celtics guard Derrick White started 3 for 4 from the 3-point line, and his pull-up from the top of the key with 6:18 left gave Boston a 19-7 lead. Its advantage remained in double digits the final 39 and a half minutes.
Brown was a distributor for most of the opening quarter. He passed up a few challenging shots to find teammates closer to the rim, but he scored 7 points in the final three minutes — all inside the arc — helping the Celtics extend their lead to 39-17.
The shooting cooled slightly in the second quarter, but the big lead left room for that. A 3-pointer by Hauser with 10:06 left stretched the advantage to 49-21 and provided another example of Boston’s balance. Nearly midway through the quarter, no Celtic had attempted more than five shots.
Boston’s defense let up in the third quarter — five turnovers added extra stress — and Reaves found a second wind following his slow start.
He poured in 16 points in the period, and the Lakers shot 63.2 percent from the field, helping them pull within 97-82 after three quarters. But the Celtics started the fourth with a 9-0 run.
“These last two games, we kind of just put our foot on the gas and took care of business,” Pritchard said.
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Adam Himmelsbach can be reached at adam.himmelsbach@globe.com. Follow him @adamhimmelsbach.
Smoke from the Canadian wildfires that engulfed the Northeast United States in a haze hardly let up in Greater Boston.
But Saturday’s rain may have cleared the skies just in time for the World Cup final in New Jersey on Sunday.
The Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection issued an air quality alert that the fine particles from smoke across the entire state averaged at a level “Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups,” which includes people “with lung or heart disease, older adults, and children.”
Fine particulates that are 2.5 micrometers or less in diameter (PM2.5) were tracked at a level of 130, which the agency rates as in the middle of the 101-150 “Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups,” at multiple locations in the city and in nearby municipalities.
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The U.S. Air Quality Index also recorded a 130 rating for much of the region but the city itself was rated at 166 near South Station, with nearby locations including Quincy, Chelsea, and Lynn hovering around 160 PM2.5. This concentration falls under the “Unhealthy” category.
Similar warnings were issued throughout much of the country Saturday.
At MetLife Stadium, where the World Cup final is scheduled to take place, the sky was the same thick, soupy gray it has been for days, even after a drenching thunderstorm prompted warnings of flash flooding and forced the Spanish national team to suspend its last outdoor training session ahead of the clash with Argentina.
Saturday’s storm front will largely move the smoke out of the Northeast before the final between Spain and Argentina, said Tyler Roys, a senior meteorologist at AccuWeather.
“There could be some lingering smoke that would make things hazy, but very faint,” Roys said. “In terms of the thickest smoke, the smoke that has really been eye-popping and leads to poor air quality, that is not expected across New York City or much of the Northeast.”
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The air quality index shows an improvement from unhealthy air for sensitive groups on Saturday to “moderate” air quality Sunday in East Rutherford, which means little to no health risk for the general public.
BOSTON (WHDH) – Boston police are investigating a shooting in Allston on Friday night that left a man dead, officials said.
Officers responding to a report of a person shot in the area of 20 Rugg Road around 10:30 p.m. found a man inside suffering from a gunshot wound, according to Boston police. Boston EMS treated him on-scene before he was taken to a nearby hospital, where he was pronounced dead. His name has not been released.
No arrests have been made.
No additional information was immediately available.
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This is a developing news story; stay with 7NEWS on-air and online for the latest details.
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Ariana Grande is coming to Boston next week and one of her biggest fans in Massachusetts will be there after resolving a ticket issue with StubHub.
Kelsie Duest of Hopedale had two front row balcony seats to Grande’s show on July 23 at TD Garden. Her brother bought them for her on StubHub last year. Her mother said it cost nearly $1,400 for the pair.
But about a month later, Sharon Duest checked her Apple Wallet and noticed the tickets were invalid. She said StubHub offered them a choice, take a refund or different tickets.
Kelsie Duest has two seats to Ariana Grande’s show on July 23 at TD Garden in Boston.
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Duest ended up accepting the tickets that were offered, only to learn they were obstructed view seats behind the stage and Kelsie wouldn’t be able to see Grande during parts of the concert.
Concerned that her daughter, who has Down syndrome, would miss out on the experience of seeing Grande on stage, Duest tried calling and emailing Stubhub hoping to get better seats.
“We didn’t want anything for free. We just wanted just the tickets that we had,” she told WBZ-TV.
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With the concert coming up soon, the Duests reached out to the I-Team’s Call for Action for help, who contacted StubHub.
“We’re so sorry about the issues Sharon experienced with their ticket order, especially given how meaningful this concert is to Kelsie,” a company spokesperson said in an email.
“We understand how disappointing and stressful that situation was. Our Customer Care team worked with them to resolve the issue and ultimately secured upgraded replacement tickets in a section in front of where the original seats were located, allowing them to attend the show with an improved view.”
Kelsie and her mom now have club seats closer to the stage than the tickets they originally purchased.
“I know we couldn’t have done this without you guys. Thank you, thank you from the bottom of our hearts,” Sharon Duest said.
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A good rule of thumb with electronic tickets is to always check on them to confirm that they remain valid up until the event. You should also keep good records in case you need a refund or a replacement.
