{"id":672010,"date":"2026-03-22T04:41:12","date_gmt":"2026-03-22T04:41:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/672010\/"},"modified":"2026-03-22T04:41:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-22T04:41:12","slug":"celtics-notes-garza-tie-breaker-walsh-pritchard-tatum-brown","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/672010\/","title":{"rendered":"Celtics Notes: Garza, Tie-Breaker, Walsh, Pritchard, Tatum, Brown"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Celtics got a huge lift from backup center Luka Garza<\/a> on Friday as they pulled out a close game in Memphis, writes Souichi Terada of Mass Live<\/a>. Garza has fallen out of the rotation a couple of times this season, but an injury to Nikola Vucevic<\/a> has him playing regular minutes again. Against the Grizzlies, he delivered his best game since signing with Boston last summer, contributing 22 points and seven rebounds in 27 minutes.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you get into kind of a rhythm like that and get to the glass and make little plays, it\u2019s a lot of fun,\u201d Garza said. \u201cBut every night, we have a lot of guys who do that. \u2026 Guys have always stepped up. In my position, just try to make the little plays and help us win. So it\u2019s definitely fun when you\u2019re the guy doing that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Vucevic is hoping to return<\/a> from a fractured finger before the regular season ends, and it\u2019s not clear how the front court minutes will be divided up if that happens. Garza said even if his playing time is cut again, he\u2019ll be ready for whatever opportunity he\u2019s given.<\/p>\n

\u201cI love being a part of this team,\u201d he added. \u201cWe play hard every single night no matter what, and I think when you do that, you put yourself in a good position. Especially in a situation like tonight where we obviously had the talent advantage. You play hard long enough, you finally get that rhythm.\u201d<\/p>\n

There\u2019s more on the Celtics:<\/p>\n

Even with the win, Boston suffered a setback on Friday in its bid to hold off New York for the No. 2 seed in the East, according to Brian Robb of MassLive<\/a>. The Knicks\u2018 one-point victory at Brooklyn ensured that they\u2019ll have the head-to-head tiebreaker over the Celtics based on their better record against Atlantic Division teams.
\nJordan Walsh<\/a> was an effective defensive force earlier in the season, but Boston\u2019s abundance of wings has pushed him out of the rotation, Robb states in a mailbag column<\/a>. Ron Harper Jr.<\/a> is likely to see an expanded role in anticipation of having his two-way deal converted to a standard contract, so Walsh may have to settle for limited minutes going forward. Robb also addresses the possibility of an extension for Payton Pritchard<\/a>, who will become eligible for a new deal this summer.
\nJayson Tatum<\/a> has been getting help from his teammates, particularly Jaylen Brown<\/a>, as he tries to rediscover his game after a long absence, Gary Washburn of The Boston Globe<\/a> notes in a subscriber-only piece. \u201cSometimes things are not going your way or you miss some shots early, you need an easy one,\u201d Brown said. \u201cI\u2019ve been there. I know what that feels like. So sometimes, you overthink a little bit too. It\u2019s his first couple of games back, so I think just trying to find him in a rhythm and help him as much as I can is something when I\u2019m on the floor, I\u2019m looking for.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Celtics got a huge lift from backup center Luka Garza on Friday as they pulled out a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":672011,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3766],"tags":[7,45,75,3798,46,78,77,4989,17915,6,3853,405,24853],"class_list":["post-672010","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boston-celtics","tag-basketball","tag-boston","tag-boston-celtics","tag-bostonceltics","tag-celtics","tag-jaylen-brown","tag-jayson-tatum","tag-jordan-walsh","tag-luka-garza","tag-nba","tag-nikola-vucevic","tag-payton-pritchard","tag-ron-harper-jr"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116270996510046601","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/672010","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=672010"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/672010\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/672011"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=672010"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=672010"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=672010"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}