With the No. 2 seed already wrapped up, the Celtics will finish out the campaign against the Orlando Magic on Sunday night.
The Boston Celtics will wrap up the NBA's regular season on Sunday night (6 p.m. ET) when they take on the Orlando Magic at TD Garden.
The Celtics (55-26) have already secured the No. 2 seed in the Eastern Conference playoff race, and as a result, are sitting most of their regulars in this matchup, including Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown.
The Magic are 45-36 and can still finish anywhere between the No. 6 and No. 8 spots in the playoff race. Remember, the No. 7 and No. 8 seeds are officially decided by the annual "play-in" tournament.
Smart thinking by Boston
Given that this game is meaningless for the C's, it's certainly good for them to give guys like Tatum and Brown the night off before the playoffs, especially as Tatum continues to work back from his torn Achilles. In addition, they are also sitting Neemias Queta and Derrick White. They are probably going to sit Nikola Vucevic, Sam Hauser and Payton Pritchard, which also makes sense.
Furthermore, given the possibility of Orlando earning the No. 7 seed and becoming Boston's first round playoff opponent, it makes sense to sit guys and not give the Magic any more looks at the Celtics full complement of weapons or their full plan of attack.
History for one, not for the other
As noted by Taylor Snow on social media, Celtics' head coach Joe Mazzulla enters this game with some pretty incredible history already under his belt.
Joe Mazzulla has reached 55 wins in all four seasons he's coached the Celtics.
Only two coaches in team history have more 55-win seasons:
Red Auerbach – 6 (in 16 seasons)
KC Jones – 5 (in 5 seasons)
Boston had four 55-win seasons in its previous 31 years before the Joe era.
Mazzulla took over before the 2022-23 season in relief of Ime Udoka, who was let go for non-basketball reasons. He won the NBA championship in his second full season as head coach (2023-24) as Boston defeated the Dallas Mavericks.
While Mazzulla has that history, White won't get a chance to make history. He will fall two blocks shy of becoming the first player in NBA history with at least 200 three-pointers made and 100 blocks recorded. Regardless, he's one of the best two-way players in the NBA, and he's likely to finish inside the Top 10 in Defensive Player of the Year voting again.
We'll have more coverage after the game here at CelticsRoundtable.
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