NBA Cup: Boston Celtics Roll to Second Win in Group Stage

The Boston Celtics beat the Charlotte Hornets by a lopsided margin of 119-80 on Friday night in Game 2 of the NBA Cup.

The Celtics beat the Chicago Bulls last Friday in the first game of the in-season tournament and still have two more games to go in Group Stage play before getting to the elimination round.

Boston is in a group with Chicago, Charlotte, the Atlanta Hawks and Washington Wizards. They'll play each team in Group Stage play with the winner advancing to December's knockout round.

This is the fourth year of the NBA Cup and the Celtics have never won it.

The Celtics are 7-2 overall this season, and these NBA Cup games count toward the overall standings.

Here's what you need to know from the victory.

From an offensive perspective, this is one of the weirdest 39-point blowouts you'll see. The Celtics only had three players in double-figures, with Tatum leading the way with 34 points on 9-of-16 shooting.

He's really struggled from 3-point range so far this season, but he was 5-for-8 in this one, and he also went 11-of-11 at the foul line, continuing his blitzing pace at the charity stripe.

In addition to this 34 points, he also had nine assists and eight rebounds, though he did have four turnovers.

Derrick White (18) and Payton Pritchard (12) were the only others in double-figures.

It wasn't just Tatum. The whole team shot well from deep, going 24-of-54 (55 percent). You're going to win a lot of games if you score 72 points at the at the 3-point line per night. The Hornets made just 11 threes, meaning the Celtics outscored them by 39 points in that regard. That's the same difference as the margin of victory. Ballgame.

Robinson had 10 rebounds in the Celtics last win against the Milwaukee Bucks on Wednesday, and he made an impact on the stat sheet here, going for six points and seven rebounds in just 15 minutes.

I'm sure the Celtics would like even more impact from someone they paid nearly $50 million to this offseason, but he's starting to make his presence felt more regularly. And that can only be a good thing for a team that has designs on making a very deep playoff run this June.