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Tim BontempsESPN
Danny Ainge, president of Boston Celtics basketball operations, grew up in Eugene, Oregon, and after a stellar four-year career with BYU, made his living during his 14-year NBA career as a tough, tough guard who could shoot.
Decades later, Ainge fell in love with another Oregon child during the design process. And while rookie Payton Pritchard didn’t attend Ainge’s alma mater, he did have a four-year decorated career at the University of Oregon and owned an NBA-quality jump shot like Ainge’s.
That prompted Ainge to draft Pritchard with the 26th pick in last November’s NBA draft, a roster he and the Celtics likely hoped would become a small part of coach Brad Stevens’ rotation this season. Instead, Pritchard has become a vital part of Boston’s hopes of making another deep playoff run.
On Thursday night against the Raptors, Pritchard showed why, scoring 20 points while going 6-for-8 from a 3-point range to help the Celtics beat the Toronto Raptors 120-106 on a night when the two stars of the team this season, Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown, combined to shoot 8-for-27.
“They’re drawing so much crowd, so they’re going to have to pull a doubles team or something,” Pritchard said afterwards. “So our job is to clean up the floor and find openings for them.”
As a four-year-old college player with a nimble shooting feel, Pritchard certainly fit the bill for the type of player capable of making an early impact in the league. Still, it’s a high bar for a rookie to walk into a team with championship ambitions, like Boston, and become a vital part of the team’s rotation. Fellow rookie Aaron Nesmith, for example – the 14th pick in the 2020 draft – has barely played.
Pritchard, on the other hand, is now clearly the sixth man on the team. He’s played in every game this season when he was healthy – and for more than 10 minutes in every game, except the one in which he sustained an MCL sprain against the Philadelphia 76ers on January 22. Even with those missed games, he has earned more. 3-pointers than all except Tatum and Brown at the Celtics this season, while his 46.9% clip from behind the arc puts him in second place behind Memphis’ Desmond Bane (48.2%) among rookies taking at least three triples per game, and 10th of all players who played so much per game this season.
And while acknowledging that Pritchard is not expected to make six 3s per game, Stevens said he could see right away that the rookie had a chance to make an impact this season.
Before the training camp began, said Stevens,[the draftees] came a few days after the design, and after some testing we were able to work in small groups, and you could tell it was quite advanced. “
Part of what has made Pritchard so important is the lack of options around him on the Boston couch. No one doubts the Celtics’ top talent on the fringe, between Tatum, Brown, Kemba Walker and Marcus Smart (who is currently out with a calf bandage).
However, the options behind them are limited. Jeff Teague was contracted as the team’s primary backup point guard, but after scoring 19 points in the Celtics’ opening game of the season, he’s shot 30% off the field (including a gruesome 28% at 2- point shots) and wax fell from Stevens’ rotation, with Pritchard taking his spot as the bank’s first guard.
While Semi Ojeleye had 24 points in his career on Thursday, including his own 6-for-8 performance from a 3-point range, that’s far from common, as he came in on Thursday averaging less than one 3 per game. Boston’s other usual bench rotation players – Tristan Thompson, Grant Williams, and Robert Williams – all bring in different skills, but none can be counted on for an immediate strike.
Undoubtedly, no one else on the team can come in and provide that instant strike like Pritchard did on Thursday – and has done so all season. And while he was an accomplished point guard in Oregon, playing on a Boston team with Walker, Tatum and Brown has enabled Pritchard to slide in perfectly as an off-ball player whose shot the opponents have to respect. He gives the Celtics’ main scoring opportunities vital space to operate and has been good enough defensively to hold his own.
And in a match where Tatum and Brown missed 19 shots, that distance – and the hot shots from Pritchard, Ojeyele and Walker – who went 5-for-8 from three-point range – allowed them to score 19 times. helps.
Questions will linger about the depth of Boston. While Pritchard has clearly established himself as the team’s main guard outside the bench, and Boston’s quartet of great men – Daniel Theis, Thompson and both Williamses – will play a role, the team still has no depth behind its trio of wings in Tatum. , Brown and smart.
Thanks to both the $ 28 million trade exception created by Gordon Hayward’s departure in this off-season and its status as one of the few contenders to control the first round moving forward, Boston has the opportunity to take a piece add between now and next month’s transaction deadline. And since the East seems wide open at the moment, such a move could give the Celtics a chance to finally break through and return to the NBA Finals after reaching the Eastern Conference Finals in three of the past four. seasons.
Pritchard’s play, however, has allayed some of the scoring concerns that come from outside of Boston’s best options. As a result, less than two months into his rookie season, Pritchard has made Ainge look farsighted about betting on another four-year-old from Oregon.