![\"Nikola](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2269966562-e1775433323101.jpg\")
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Nikola Vucevic #4 of the Boston Celtics and Jayson Tatum #0 of the Boston Celtics <\/p>\n
The Boston Celtics<\/a> completed their season sweep of the Raptors<\/a> on Sunday, also winning their 10th game in the last 12 outings, and in doing so welcomed back a player who could yet be a pivotal part of the playoff rotation: center Nikola Vucevic<\/a>, who was acquired at the trade deadline, played 11 games, broke his finger in the 12th game (on March 6) and had not played since.<\/p>\n Vucevic\u2019s absence was mostly overshadowed by the return of Jayson Tatum, but the fact that the Celtics have not been able to work their critical bench piece, obtained from the Bulls at the deadline for Anfernee Simons<\/a>,\u00a0 into the rotation is a concern. He played only 13 minutes in his return on Sunday, scoring four points. The Celtics have four games ahead to get Vucevic up to speed and determine how they will use him in the playoffs.<\/p>\n That\u2019s not a lot of time. And on Sunday, coach Joe Mazzulla was asked about Vucevic\u2019s return and gave a worrying answer for Celtics backers.<\/p>\n Nikola Vucevic\u2019s Best Celtics Game Came in Debut<\/p>\n The return for Vucevic was a modest one, but after the game, Mazzulla told reporters that the team still has not really seen how the best version of Vucevic fits with these Celtics.\u00a0 He was asked about being worried that Vucevic, who has not been to the playoffs since 2022, might try to come in and do too much.<\/p>\n Quite the opposite, Mazzulla indicated.<\/p>\n \u201cHe just wants to win. He has been in the league a long time,\u201d Mazzulla said<\/a>. \u201cIf anything, making sure he is aggressive enough to where we have the best version of him so that we can have a different layer from him in terms of what we want to accomplish. I think up to this point, the best version of him for our team is what we saw in the Miami game. So I think we have to get that back and replicate that.\u201d<\/p>\n Nikola Vucevic Was \u2018Fine\u2019 in Injury Return<\/p>\n And that\u2019s the worrisome thing for the Celtics\u2013the Miami game was Vucevic\u2019s debut, back on February 6. He played for a month with Boston without playing as well as he did on that night, and has since sat out another month with the finger injury.<\/p>\n It\u2019s a safe bet that when\u00a0 the Celtics traded for Vucevic on February 5, they did not expect that he would peak in his debut<\/a>.<\/p>\n Again, there is a eek of regular-season action to figure this out. As for how Vucevic looked on Sunday, Mazzulla was ambivalent.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was good. I think it was only 13 minutes,\u201d he said. \u201cI thought, offensively, he made the right reads. Missed a couple. Second half, we were looking at some different matchup stuff, so didn\u2019t get him in as much as we wanted to in the second half, but he was fine, I thought. Just going to continue to get him acclimated.\u201d<\/p>\n GettyJoe Mazzulla, Boston Celtics<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Celtics Big Men Must Control Paint, Set Screens<\/p>\n No doubt, Vucevic is a much different player in the middle than starter Neemias Queta, more skilled as a scorer and passer, but not as solid defensively. Mazzulla said there are things he is looking for from Celtics big men, no matter which one is on the floor.<\/p>\n \u201cHis role as a big is one, defensively, controlling the paint with rebounds and his pick-and-roll defense,\u201d Mazzulla said, :and then offensively, being dynamic and\u2014we don\u2019t quite know how teams will defend him. Sometimes we have to be able to read that in real time.<\/p>\n \u201cSo I think his role is just like our other 5s, they\u2019re the connectors, they\u2019re the people that make plays for us on the offensive end with their screening which, you know, he takes pride in. And then defensively, rebounding and controlling the paint.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tSean Deveney<\/a> is a veteran sports reporter covering the NBA, NFL and MLB for Heavy.com. He has written for Heavy since 2019 and has more than two decades of experience covering the NBA, including 17 years as the lead NBA reporter for the Sporting News. Deveney is the author of 7 nonfiction books, including “Fun City,” “Before Wrigley became Wrigley,” and “Facing Michael Jordan.” More about Sean Deveney<\/a>\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tMore Heavy on Celtics\n\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\t\tLoading more stories\n\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Getty Nikola Vucevic #4 of the Boston Celtics and Jayson Tatum #0 of the Boston Celtics The Boston…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":700471,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3766],"tags":[7,45,75,3798,46,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-700470","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-boston-celtics","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-boston","10":"tag-boston-celtics","11":"tag-bostonceltics","12":"tag-celtics","13":"tag-nba"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116354826135500298","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/700470","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=700470"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/700470\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/700471"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=700470"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=700470"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=700470"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Joe](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2258773503_556889-e1774003973462.jpg\")
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