BSJ Game Report: Hornets 118, Celtics 89 - Boston gets blown out

BOSTON — TD Garden was approved for a construction permit on Wednesday night. Unfortunately for the Boston Celtics, they were the ones getting bulldozed.

The red-hot Charlotte Hornets began the game with a LaMelo Ball back screen that led to a Moussa Diabatedunk. The jam echoed throughout the entire arena, and it was a sign of what was to come.

For the remainder of the first half, Charlotte absolutely decimated the Celtics.

Kon Knueppel was flying off screens and draining threes. Brandon Miller was attacking Baylor Scheiermanoff the dribble, making tough shot after tough shot. Anyone who touched the rock for Charlotte was liable to make a shot.

Meanwhile, the Celtics couldn't buy a bucket. Nikola Vucevic whiffed every single layup he took. Jaylen Brown did, too. The only guy who found any semblance of a rhythm for the Celtics was Derrick White.

Boston kept it close in the first half thanks to some impressive offensive rebounding (Hugo Gonzalez, in particular, was a monster on the glass), but it wasn't nearly enough.

The Celtics' missed layups allowed the Hornets to run in transition (11 fastbreak points in the first half), but more importantly, they just prevented the Celtics from putting up a reasonable point total.

By the end of the first half, Charlotte was up 64-43.

There were some fleeting signs of life in the third quarter. White went on a personal scoring run that forced a Charles Leetimeout. Brown had a big-time poster dunk that was followed by a Scheierman three. But every time Boston got the TD Garden crowd flowing, the Hornets snuffed out the momentum.

In the final few minutes of the third, Brown missed a layup that hung on the rim for over three seconds, and not long after, Coby Whiteran the floor for an and-one layup. It was crushing.

Nothing went down for Boston. They got a pair of wide-open triples to start the fourth (one for Scheierman and one for Gonzalez), but neither fell. It painted the perfect picture of the evening.

That was that. The walls continued to crumble around the Celtics for the rest of the game, as the Hornets surged to a blowout victory in what was easily one of Boston's worst performances of the season.

Big winner: It's official: White has refound his shot.

The offensive woes that plagued White earlier in the season are no longer. He was the only Celtic to put up respectable shooting numbers on Wednesday night, and even his splits were fueled by an impressive third quarter.

Still, seeing him gain some momentum heading into the final months of the season is a great sign.

Ouch, tough one: The entire game? Maybe?

Boston failed to guard the pick-and-roll, giving up easy floaters to Knueppel and LaMelo Ball all night. They helped off of three-point shooters, which they often do, but didn't close out well enough afterward. They barely forced any turnovers, either. Vucevic and Payton Pritchard couldn't make anything all night long. Neemias Quetawas all over the place on both ends.

But if there were to be one negative takeaway from this game, it would be the missed layups. That was the root of most of Boston's problems, especially in the first half.

If the Celtics had made their layups, they could have set their defense, they wouldn't have given up a consistent flow of four-on-five transition opportunities, and they would have scored more than 43 first-half points.

It was ugly, ugly basketball, and the Celtics' inability to convert in the paint was the worst of the worst.

The big picture: Charlotte was the better basketball team on Wednesday night. They outplayed the Celtics in every aspect of the game. Simple as that.

But the Celtics will have plenty of lessons to learn from this.

The Hornets stuck to the Celtics' bodies in every pick-and-roll, so how can they generate more separation? Charlotte's pick-and-roll shredded Boston's drop coverage, so should they bring the bigs up to hedge?

There will be no shortage of problems to solve in Thursday's film session.