How Ime Udoka Feels About Celtics’ Progress After Win Vs. Raptors

BOSTON — Boston Celtics head coach Ime Udoka shared before Wednesday’s game against the Toronto Raptors that he was optimistic with how the team was beginning to find it’s identity.

The Celtics then went out and earned a 104-88 win with another strong defensive performance against a Raptors team that absolutely shellacked them the first time around earlier this season. It marked the third time in the last four games where the Celtics have held their opponent to 88 points or less. They won each of those three contests.

And it’s clear Udoka sees Wednesday as another step in the right direction.

“I think we’ve gelled to some extent,” Udoka said after the win. “Obviously that Florida trip was amazing holding teams to 78 and 79 but even 88 (points) tonight against a well-oiled offensive team is a good job. So we’re learning the intensity and effort it takes to win every night. Defensively, it’s like I said early in the season, it’s a continuation to training camp with some guys being in and out and I think we’re starting to learn what we have to do to win on that end. We’re mixing up some coverages, we found out what the guys do better than we did in the preseason. And I think as coaches we’ve learned as well, but the players have taken that to heart. We’re hurt by what we did in the first game against these guys and really took it to heart and brought the effort tonight.”

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Udoka pointed out how he was encouraged that the C’s “focused on the details” they had been hammering away at in the lead up to the contest. Among those areas were offensive rebounds (six allowed) and transition points (18 allowed), which Boston did a much better job with Wednesday than during its previous loss to Toronto.

The Celtics now get set to face another tough opponent with the Milwaukee Bucks coming to TD Garden on Friday.