Celtics Notes: 44-Minute Game Barely Noticeable For C’s In Comeback Win

The NBA’s first-ever 44-minute game was … not a whole lot different than the standard 48-minute ones.

Boston Celtics coach Brad Stevens, whose team visited the Brooklyn Nets on Sunday for the abbreviated preseason contest, said the adjusted clock barely registered in his mind.

“You notice it a little bit when you’re subbing at the start of quarters,” Stevens told reporters after Boston’s 95-90, come-from-behind win. “I thought the flow with the one less timeout was actually a little bit better in the second and fourth (quarters). But no, I didn’t notice it other than that.”

Celtics forward Jeff Green said he didn’t even notice the four missing minutes.

“Not at all,” he said, via the team’s official Twitter account.

— The game, which shaved off one minute per quarter and eliminated two automatic timeouts, took 1 hour, 58 minutes to complete. The NBA average is 2 hours, 15 minutes.

— The Celtics trailed by as many as 17 points after a horrendous first-half shooting performance. At one point during the second quarter, they had more fouls (11) than made shots (seven).

“I didn’t think we’d get to 60 (points) at one point the way we were scoring,” Stevens said.

That began to change late in the second. A strong stretch by Jared Sullinger and Marcus Smart cut the deficit to 11 at halftime, and Boston’s offense finally started clicking in the third quarter. The Celtics scored 33 points in that frame after managing just 40 in the first half, and they closed it out with a 14-3 run to take their first lead of the game.

— The Celtics crushed the Nets on the offensive boards, hauling in 20 offensive rebounds compared to Brooklyn’s seven. In fact, Sullinger had more offensive boards than the entire Nets roster until very late in the fourth quarter.

— Sullinger (21 points, 19 rebounds) was a beast on both ends, coming one rebound short of a 20-20 performance despite the altered game length.

— Smart was his usually pesky self on the defensive end. The rookie came up with three steals, including this one that led to this Avery Bradley finish.

Smart also finished with 13 points — one of six Celtics players to reach double figures — and a plus-16 rating that ranked second on the team behind Green.

“He was good. He impacted it,” Stevens said of Smart. “He’s an energy-raiser, and that helps. He was one of the guys that I thought was (playing well) a little bit in the first half, although he had a couple of plays that he’d like to have back. But I thought he had his normal amount of juice.”

— Nets coach Lionel Hollins had a great postgame comment on reserve center Jerome Jordan, who racked up 17 points on 7-of-7 shooting in the absence of Kevin Garnett and Brook Lopez

[tweet https://twitter.com/TimBontemps/status/523947597707632640 align=’center’]

Jordan hasn’t played in the NBA since 2012 and spent last season with Italian club Virtus Bologna.

— Gerald Wallace returned to action for the Celtics but played just five minutes. James Young, meanwhile, remained out as he recovers from a hamstring injury suffered before the team’s preseason opener. Stevens hopes to have the rookie back in the mix early this week.

“We probably won’t go live in practice (Monday) and then we’ll go live Tuesday,” Stevens said, via Celtics.com. “Hopefully that progression allows him to do that by Tuesday.”

GIF via @MrTrpleDouble10

Photo via Anthony Gruppuso/USA TODAY Sports Images