Boston Celtics TOO MUCH for New York Knicks? | Locked On Crossover Preview

Summary

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Locked On Celtics & Knicks Crossover: Are the Celtics Too Much for New York?

Date: April 9, 2026
Hosts: John Corrales (Locked On Celtics), Gavin Shaw (Locked On Knicks)
Main Theme: An in-depth, two-way preview of the Celtics-Knicks matchup and a potential playoff series, dissecting both teams’ strengths, weaknesses, rotations, and playoff readiness.

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Episode Overview

This special crossover episode of Locked On Celtics brings together John Corrales and Gavin Shaw for a detailed discussion about the state of both franchises as they head into a key matchup and potentially a playoff collision. The conversation oscillates between macro-level team identity and micro-level Xs and Os, with honest appraisals of strengths, coaching decisions, and star player development.

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Boston Celtics: Return of Jayson Tatum & Evolving Hierarchy

(02:00-08:08)

• Early Returns & Tatum's Recovery
  • Tatum’s recovery from a devastating injury has exceeded expectations due to fortunate circumstances (having the world’s top Achilles surgeon in New York “ready to stitch [him] up the next day” – John Corrales, 02:43).
  • He's come back “ahead of schedule…not a role player…now he's Tatum – and it does change the dynamic a lot.” (John Corrales, 03:49)
• Tatum-Brown Dynamic
  • Jalen Brown’s rise and Tatum’s willingness to mix roles has lightened any “tug of war” concern. Tatum “seems very happy to just kind of stand in the corner sometimes…and be a full participant in the offense. His playmaking has been…more natural than ever.” (John Corrales, 05:49)
  • The division of roles feels “more equal than it’s been in the past.”
• Championship Contender or Not?
  • Numbers and eye test say Boston has the edge, but unproven playoff roles (especially for young bigs like Neemias Queta and wings like Baylor Scheierman, Jordan Walsh, Hugo Gonzalez) keep Corrales cautious: “For all the greatness Queta has shown, I haven’t seen them be depended on as much as they’ll be in the playoffs…they could also lose [to the Knicks or Pistons] and I wouldn’t be shocked.” (John Corrales, 09:51)
  • Quote: “I’ve been doing a whole lot of shutting up when it comes to questions about the Celtics this year, but it’s still a question that I think is fair to ask.” (John Corrales, 09:21)

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New York Knicks: Lineup Questions & Untapped Ceiling

(16:12-22:47)

• The Starting Lineup’s Ceiling & Frustrations
  • Despite record improvement and a top-3 league offense, Knicks fans are “doom-and-gloom” due to persistent issues with the starting group, particularly how teams attack Josh Hart and Cat (Karl-Anthony Towns).
  • “All the pieces of a title team or a near title team…are there. I just don’t think they’ve maximized this group. And for the second straight year, under a new head coach, they’re making all the same mistakes.” (Gavin Shaw, 18:41)
• Karl-Anthony Towns as an Offensive Hub
  • Towns continues to voice that he’s “still figuring it out” in his new role—prompting concerns about fit. “I’m laughing because he’s said that once every two weeks all year.” (Gavin Shaw, 19:47)
  • Knicks’ offense hums when Cat’s paired with shooters—but “teams like Boston just put a wing on Cat and the ‘hub’ concept falls apart quickly.” (Gavin Shaw, 20:11)
• Josh Hart’s 3-Point Shooting: Mirage or Weapon?
  • “It’s not real in the sense that he still doesn’t want to shoot threes…and it’s the single most frustrating experience I’ve had watching basketball.” (Gavin Shaw, 22:47)
  • Past playoff flashes exist (“shot like 12 of 18 on threes vs. Philly”), but expecting that consistently is a gamble.

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Key Matchup Insights & Series X-Factors

(25:33-39:43)

Celtics’ Playmakers, Spacing, and Adaptability

(28:45-34:30)

• Last Year’s Playoff Vulnerability
  • The Knicks successfully baited Tatum/Brown into isolations—limiting Boston’s passing and swing-sequence offense.
• This Year’s Improvements
  • Brown’s ballhandling is “really great…he’s able to finish crafty around the rim. If you help, you’re helping off Hauser, White, or Tatum—tough decisions.” (John Corrales, 31:20)
  • Queta has evolved as a dynamic secondary scorer, especially in the dunker spot—“what Queta has become…is not the guy you remember from last matchup.” (John Corrales, 33:13)
• Bench & Rotation
  • Corrales flags the bench (Peyton Pritchard, Scheireman, Walsh, Vucevic, Garza) as both a swing factor and a question mark: “How these bench units…might be where this series gets decided.” (John Corrales, 35:02)

Knicks’ Adjustments & Rotational Uncertainty

(36:47-42:40)

• Mitchell Robinson’s Impact
  • Robinson’s defense could swing games, but he’s vulnerable to stretch bigs like Vucevic or Garza: “One continued weakness for [Robinson] is exactly what you say—stretch fives.” (Gavin Shaw, 37:16)
• Bench Matchups
  • Knicks’ “accelerants” are Deuce McBride (much improved) and Robinson; Celtics’ are Pritchard and the “energy wings.”
• Celtics’ Rotation: True ‘Next Man Up’
  • Missoula’s approach: “We don’t have a rotation. We get everybody ready and go with what the game needs. They’ve all bought into that.” (John Corrales, 41:27)
  • Young wings like Gonzalez, Shireman, Walsh, and Garza could get surprise minutes if the game demands; this unpredictability has been a feature, not a bug.

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• Tatum’s Comeback
  “You don’t usually get to do both—come back from a devastating injury early and look like yourself pretty quickly. But that’s what Tatum’s doing.”
  – John Corrales (02:43)

• Rotation Philosophy
  “What rotation? We don’t have a rotation. That’s why everybody stays ready. We get everybody ready and we go with what the game needs.”
  – John Corrales (41:27)

• Knicks’ Lineup Issues
  “They consistently, thanks to that starting lineup, get off to terrible starts. And I think it does point to some broader roster construction issues.”
  – Gavin Shaw (17:49)

• Josh Hart’s Reluctant Shooting
  “It’s the single most frustrating experience I’ve had watching basketball…and I spent a full season watching Emmanuel Mudiay and Alonzo Trier.”
  – Gavin Shaw (22:47)

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Key Timestamps

• 02:00 – Crossover begins; Tatum’s recovery and impact
• 05:40 – Tatum-Brown dynamic post-injury
• 07:03 – Celtics’ contender status, playoff variability
• 16:12 – Knicks lineup, sources of fan pessimism
• 18:41 – Shaw’s diagnosis: Knicks have the pieces, not the chemistry/coaching
• 20:11 – Cat’s fit as offensive hub and matchup questions
• 22:47 – Josh Hart’s 3-point shooting: stats vs. reality
• 28:45 – Previous playoff matchups; Celtics’ playmaking and roster changes
• 33:13 – Growth of Neemias Queta and bench depth
• 34:30 – Corrales on curiosity about how Celtics defend Mitchell Robinson and respond with stretch bigs
• 36:47 – Shaw on Knicks’ defensive usage of Robinson and bench matchup intrigue
• 41:27 – The “no rotation” approach under Missoula

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Takeaway & Tone

This episode stands out for its candor and depth. Both hosts trade admiration and skepticism about their own clubs. Corrales remains cautiously optimistic, emphasizing the unknowns of Boston’s young supporting cast. Shaw is more overtly concerned with structural issues in New York’s roster and coaching choices, even as he acknowledges the high ceiling.

Fans of both teams will come away with a sharper understanding of:

• The stakes and uncertainty ahead of a possible playoff collision
• The subtle ways both franchises have evolved—and where their ceilings or pitfalls may lie

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Final Thoughts

While Boston appears (on paper) to be "the team to beat" in the East, neither host is ready to crown a conference champion just yet. Both the Celtics’ adaptability and the Knicks’ untapped polish could be deciding factors—and the next meeting between these two teams might reveal much about each club’s postseason fate.

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Transcript

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[John Corrales]

It's the Celtics and the Knicks tonight. What should we expect from this game and from a potential playoff series? It's a crossover preview episode. Welcome back to the show. I'm John Corralis. Today's show is all about the Celtics and the Knicks. It's a crossover episode with Gavin Shaw, host of the Locked on Knicks podcast. We get into a preview what to expect from each other. The second segment will be me asking him questions. The first segment is him asking me questions about the Celtics. We recorded this before Jalen Brown was ruled out. So no Jaylen Brown in this game. Still waiting for word on Derrick White in the Mishkeda. Jason Tatum is playing. But let's just dive into this podcast or crossover episode with Gavin Shaw.

[Gavin Shaw]

All right guys, as promised, it is a Locked On Knicks Locked On Celtics crossover. For those of you in the Locked on Celtics side, I am Gavin Shaw, the host of Locked On Knicks. For those of you on the Knicks side, you know him, you love him. He's John Corrales, the host of the Locked on Celtics podcast. And it has been an incredible season for the Boston Celtics, much to the chagrin of Knicks fans everywhere who thought all right, one year where we don't have to worry about those guys. But Boston has persisted and on top of that, they added Jason Tatum. And that is exactly where I wanted to start. John looking from afar. Early returns have been fantastic on Jayson Tatum coming back. What's the Experience been like inside the building, having him back on this team. And how is Boston reincorporated?

[John Corrales]

Yeah. Looking from not afar, from very close. Also looks very good. Shockingly so. I, I, I've been saying you don't, you don't usually get to do both, come back from a devastating injury early and also look like yourself pretty quickly. But that's what Tatum's doing. It's defying a lot of the expectations. But I think what, what really happened here is Tatum's kind of initial, you know, when it happened, where it happened. The, the, you know, the fact that it happened in New York right next to the hospital for special surgery, and the, the fact that, that the, the surgeon, the top surgeon, Achilles surgeon in the world was there is like, yeah, swing by tomorrow, I'll stitch you up. You know, that, that all played a huge role because they got to skip a lot of the things that normally hold a guy back. So Fast forward to 10 months later. Where he came out of the rehab is probably two, three months ahead of where people normally are because of all of that stuff. So Tatum comes out and Instead of playing 17 minutes in a game, you know, in, in two stints, like off the bench, like we've seen other guys do around the league, Steph Curry came off the bench. Victor Wembanyama came off the bench. Tatum comes in, starts and looks really good and got past the initial kind of rust pretty quickly. And, and he still has things that he needs to do, but the fact that he's a reasonable percentage of himself, whatever you want to call it, 80, 90, 95, it's, it's much further ahead, changes the complete calculus of what this team is because I, I was expecting, hey, 75 of Tatum. He's going to be not a role player, but very clearly a second fiddle. And now he's not. Now he's Tatum. And it does change the dynamic a lot.

[Gavin Shaw]

I, I guess to that point. I mean, what, what has the dynamic been like between him and Jalen Brown is even amongst the Celtics, just extraordinary success the last five, basically this whole era with those two guys, like, it seems like there's been a little bit of a tug of war there at times. And I know that was like a concern when Tatum was coming back just because Jalen is having this incredible season. And I think part of it is like, it's kind of the same theory as Jalen Brunson, like, what can a really talented player do when you empower them completely? And the answer for Jalen Brown seems to be Especially some of the injuries later. Potentially a first team, all NBA type season. Like, has that been a back and forth, or has Jason Tatum been pretty content to be like, all right, I will have my moments, I will have my stretches to take over. At the end of the game, it's Brown's team. At the end of the game, it's Tatum's team.

[John Corrales]

Or.

[Gavin Shaw]

Or if they just kind of worked it out synergistically. And that hasn't been an issue at all.

[John Corrales]

I think it's skewed more Brown, but I. I think it's a little bit more kind of equal. More equal than it's been.

[Gavin Shaw]

Yeah.

[John Corrales]

The way I've been putting it is you took Tatum's job and you took Brown's job, and you kind of elevated Brown, put it together, and then split it equally between the two, understanding that Tatum is still not fully athletically himself. And that's gonna. That's gonna take the whole summer, you know, but he is getting closer to that as well. But Tatum seems very happy to just kind of stand in the corner sometimes and be. Be a floor spacer, but also be a threat to come off pin downs and get the ball on the move and be. Be a full participant in the offense. And his playmaking. Tatum's playmaking has been just smooth, kind of natural, kind of more natural than ever. And, you know, you go around with Jalen, who has developed into a really good kind of distributor himself. Jalen's obviously a more natural kind of. He. He's. He's the. The scorer first, passer second. Tatum has become more equal in a lot of that, but the way. The way both of those guys move the ball now, it's. It could be either or it more. More than it has been in the past.

[Gavin Shaw]

Do you see this team as a championship contender at this point? As I remember preseason, we were having these conversations, and I think we're both on the same page. Like, like, not even is this, like, not a playoff level front court, but this is potentially like, borderline not an NBA level front court. And then the Miaskeda is like, just had an exceptional season. Obviously, Boston has gotten so much from their group of young wings and seemingly found, like, gem after gem after gem and all the underlying numbers. Net rating. You want to go deeper into different numbers, like, the specific areas Boston dominates, the specific areas Joe Missoula has decided to lead into. Like, all to me, like, watching this team play and looking at the numbers, like, scream like, this is a team with a legit shot to win a Championship. Is that the feeling in Boston, or is it more of a feeling of, like, might be the best team in the east, but there. There are three other teams that are essentially all at that level. Maybe the list is shorter than that. Maybe the list is longer than that. Potentially facing, like, a ferocious, like, Charlotte team or Atlanta team or Philly team in the first round. The east is deeper than ever, and it's more of a crapshoot. Or do you feel like Boston is, like, maybe the favorite to win the Eastern Conference at this point?

[John Corrales]

It's weird that I can say it's both because I feel like the Celtics can be the favorites. If you sit there and say the Celtics are the favorites to come out, all the things that you said, we can go down all the stats, advanced stats and all that, and be like, yeah, man, Boston. Boston is the team to beat. There's the. The one question now. Every time I've asked the question about the Celtics, they've been like, yeah, sure, no problem.

[Gavin Shaw]

We'll.

[John Corrales]

We'll address that next game.

[Gavin Shaw]

Boom.

[John Corrales]

Now it's the playoffs soon, and I don't know what this team is as a playoff team. I can guess. I can assume. But for all of the greatness that Namish Kaeda has shown us, for all of the capable bench production that Baylor Shireman and Jordan Walsh and Hugo Gonzalez and these. These kind of role players have shown, I haven't seen it in a, you know, I haven't seen them be depended on for as much as they're going to be depended on in the playoffs. And that's going to be the big difference. They might address that in game one against whomever they play in the first series. And it'll. I'll just shut up again, which is. I've been doing a whole lot of shutting up when it comes to questions about the Celtics this year, but it's still a question that I think is fair to ask. We know Jalen's going to be great. We know Jason is going to be great. We know Derrick White, Peyton Pritchard. But. But even. Even you get to, like, a Pritchard and a Hauser, who you can depend on a lot. Those. When we talk about this matchup, like we're going to talk about later, it always comes down to who can you attack.

[Gavin Shaw]

Yeah.

[John Corrales]

And I'm curious to see what happens when these guys get attacked. The. The beauty of the Celtics in the past has been you can't really attack any of these guys.

[Gavin Shaw]

Yeah.

[John Corrales]

Now you beat. You beat the Celtics last year because the Thing you could attack was the glass, and the Celtics were vulnerable there. And that was kind of like a weird sixth man that you could attack. The Celtics are better at that, I think now. But you do have guys that you can attack. And that's, that's where I can say, can the Celtics beat first round? They should win. Can they beat. If it's the Knicks in the second round, sure, they can win that series. Could they beat the Pistons in, in the, in the conference? Sure, they can win that. They could also lose. They could also lose to the Knicks. They could also lose to the Pistons. And I wouldn't be, like, tremendously shocked. So would I. You know, if I'm. I'm putting my $50 in Monopoly money on a team to come out of the East, I'll put it on Boston. But I'm also not counting on the return necessarily. I'm not spending my winnings yet either.

[Gavin Shaw]

Yeah, that is exactly where I'm at with it. We had this conversation the other day on Locktod Knicks. And the way I framed it is I think Boston is probably the most complete team and probably the most sure thing right now. They don't have the same level of insulation and the margin for error that they had last year. And I thought that went away for them when Kristaps Porzingis was sick and if he was healthy. I still probably lean towards the idea Boston wins that series. I mean, who knows? With some of the shooting in the way Nick closed out those games, that was the one thing the Knicks didn't have an answer to. And I do think the Knicks have more plausible answers even, even defensively against Boston now. But Boston is also. And we'll get into this more third segment. They are better at picking on cat specific weaknesses than any team in the NBA. And just in general, the Knicks starting lineup, specific weaknesses that Mike Brown doubled down on last night and said, I know they've sucked for two years, but I don't really see us making a. I think that could. That could potentially spell trouble for the Knicks in a potential series, but I am getting ahead of myself. We'll take a break, we'll come back, and Celtics fans can learn a little bit about the New York Knicks before we talk about keys, the matchup between these two teams.

[John Corrales]

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[Gavin Shaw]

I can't pin it on one person. I can't pin it on one lineup. And I think, I think it's the starting lineup. Last I look, I haven't checked this morning. They were, they were, they were good. They won their 18 and a half minutes, which is a crazy number for a bad lineup against a great team, but they won it by three against the Atlanta Hawks. I think mainly because the Hawks made the. I don't even know if it was a strange decision because it might have just been holding their cards to the playoffs, but they decided to guard the Knicks traditionally. And if you guard that lineup traditionally, it can be a great lineup. If you guard it with the way Boston and other teams Implemented where? Put a big on Josh Hart, put a wing on Cat. They are not likely to have a lot of success with that group, but I believe they only have a 0.7 net rating, whereas a team, they have close to a plus seven net rating. And that just tells you what are all the other lineups doing. If this lineup that you're playing, the overwhelming amount of your minutes sucks and that means they're, they're dominating with like we, we talk on our show a lot about five out, but it's not even five out specifically. It's, it's anything but this lineup that Mike Brown came out yesterday and said like, nah, you know, we thought about it, we talked about Landry Shammit, but we're gonna, we're gonna stick with it. And, and maybe the, the point of variance there is like, all right, if there, if there's just stuff beyond our knowing, right. Josh Hart, Mikhail Bridges has, has a, has a special deal with James Dolan where they're always going to start no matter what. Maybe in the playoffs that switches to. Deuce McBride is coming off the bench, but he plays 36 minutes every game. And, and the impact of that starting lineup is lessons a little bit, which I think is totally plausible. Right now he's just coming off an injury, so we don't necessarily know what that's going to look like. And maybe he closes every game and then you get off to the slow starts that have defined this Knicks team. But you, you, you close stronger. To me like that is. That is the central point of pessimism that I have that they just consistently, but thanks to that starting lineup get off to terrible starts in games that you are playing a lineup like at times like a third of the game to nearly half a game that just isn't very good and doesn't work very well together. And I think it does point to just some broader roster construction issues where I think on paper they constructed a team that makes an incredible amount of sense. Right. You have like your, your alpha in Jalen Brunson, who maybe in, in the tertiary stuff doesn't check everything you need in a playoff number one. I think as a scorer he more than checks every box as a playoff number one. Like he's just been a historically great volume scorer in the playoffs over the last couple of seasons. Cat is just even on the nights to your point, like he hasn't had a good shooting season and yet he's basically led the Knicks in net rating all year because he just has an incredible positive impact offensively. While having the best defensive season of his career. OG and Mikhail are like the two, like two way wings, right? Every team in the league, maybe not five first round picks, Mikhail Bridges, but they wanted to trade three or four first round picks for those guys. Like there's a reason they were both so desired and it's because if you have defensive deficient superstars, those are the types of players you want to put around them. And they have, as the Celtics found out in Mitchell Robinson, like a massive weapon off the bench. Same induce McBride more depth than last year, A little bit more, not a ton more, but a little bit more coaching creativity than last year. I say all this to say to your argument. All the pieces of a title team or a near title team, Oklahoma City's in their own category are there. I just don't think they've maximized this group. And for the second straight year under a new head coach, they're making all the same mistakes. And that's what creates the sense of inevitability that you might, they might be talented enough to get through two rounds, even three rounds but eventually they're going to run into a team that's as talented and better coached and, and they're going to lose.

[John Corrales]

Are they using Carl Anthony Towns the right way? I think this is the big question. Like he, he's, he has. I just read a quote from him where, where we're 70 something games in. He's like yeah, I'm still figuring it out.

[Gavin Shaw]

Yeah, I'm laughing because he said that quote once every two weeks this entire season.

[John Corrales]

Yeah, like I'm still figuring it out. Like what is there to still figure out? Like I've, I've seen the comparisons of like they're trying to turn him into to Monta Sabonis. They're trying to turn him into a hub to run the offense through and it's, I mean is that just a flat out mistake and you're just in too deep sunk cost here?

[Gavin Shaw]

Yeah, I mean I'm sorry to be repetitive on this but it is just the starting lineup thing, right? Because when, if you put five shooters out there and maybe there are teams like the Thunder leaned into this. I'm curious if Boston would like the Knicks could start five out and they would just put K on OG Anunoby and put a wing on Cat anyways and the Knicks would still have to solve for that and it would be like a different. And the question would be all right, can OG like attack the center then and make that painful enough that Boston would have to switch back. So I don't want to be like too smug about this. Obviously the Knicks coaching staff is smart. Obviously they've thought about this. They might be on whatever the political implications are, they might have their own reasons that I'm, I'm missing that I'm just not seeing. But generally when a center is on Cat, you run that Brunson cat two man game and we saw it last night against the Hawks who write are a fantastic defense, have been as good defensively like the last 25 games. Basically any team this side of Oklahoma City and maybe maybe Detroit. I got to run the numbers again on that. But like Cat scored effortlessly in the third after like kind of a meek start to the game and they scored 14 points in the third quarter. And whether it was shooting threes, whether it was stopping at the foul line and popping like mid range jumpers in the short roll, whether it was getting into like his isolation bag in the post, whether it was scoring off offensive rebounds, whether it was like catching at the perimeter. But because it's Jalen Brunson on the other end of that two man game, you're getting a hard closeout and you can pump and go. And he's as good as any big in the league right at that pump and go. Drive. Taking contact at the rim and still finishing like he might have lost some athleticism from his apex. That's been a conversation amongst Knicks fans all year whether he's still has quite the same juice even last year. Like his dunks don't look quite as bouncy as they did. And yet I find him to be generally pretty unstoppable when an opposing center that's not Victor Wembanyama has to guard him. And if, if the Knicks can get to that, it becomes really, really difficult in other teams. You put a wing on him, it for a variety of reasons, it becomes a lot, a lot simpler. But as you know, like what happens most often, what Boston does so well, you throw that late double and it really flummoxes him. It turns the ball over I think on something like 50 of his post ups, which is a crazy, crazy number. So there's just answers there. If it's not a center guardian.

[John Corrales]

So then the, the traditional way to guard well, the way, the way the Celtics guard you, you put. They'll put Kate on Josh Hart and be like go nuts. But he's a 40% three point shooter kind of. Okay, so that's that. That's what I want to know.

[Gavin Shaw]

Yeah.

[John Corrales]

So how real is It. How real is it? Can. Can. Can he be good enough in a series? Can he have four games in a series where he's five of seven?

[Gavin Shaw]

It's not real in the sense that he still doesn't want to shoot freeze and he consistently passes up wide open threes. And it, it's the single most frustrating experience I've had watching basketball and I, I spent a full season watching Emmanuel Moudier and Alonzo Trier John while doing, while doing this job and like that. That should, that should be the free and his freedom Cantor. Kyle Shadow Kyle Quinn sick. I'm not going to critique Kyle Quinn, but point being, like I've watched some terrible basketball and I've never had more frustration than watching Josh, who to your point is having a fantastic shooting season for his career. It's not a great shooter, but it's a perfectly fine shooter. Is honestly like a town. Like he's shooting on pull up jumpers this year. I think something like 43, 44 on like pull up threes. Like he's putting up borderline like Klay Thompson numbers on pull up threes this year. But he just doesn't, he doesn't feel comfortable taking them. And there have been times in the playoffs he's been back into a corner, he's taken a bunch. Like I remember the reason the Knicks got out of the first round two years ago and beat the Sixers is because he shot like 12 of 18 on threes in the first two games of that series and that swung the series. So we've seen times where Josh is back into a corner and he kind of steals up and he takes them and he makes them. So I keep, I keep that in the back of my head is very real data. But when he doesn't shoot him, you're in trouble. When the Knicks don't consistently like the spurs tried, I'm going to say the most aggressive version of what we call that ghost coverage, right. Like Wemby's on him, but Wemby is just, is guarding the rim, right? And you're saying Josh Hart have a field day and for one quarter it was a disaster. And then Mike Brown, something snapped in his head and he just started screening with Josh Hart every single time. And the Knicks outscored the spurs by like 40 points over the rest of that game because it was Jalen Brunson playing two on one basically with the screener. And I think Boston, they, they strike a middle ground with that a little bit more. I don't think it'll ever be that easy. Like in the playoffs last year. My question I kept coming back to because the Knicks did lean into that and they did lean into Josh as a screener. I'm like, all right, Boston's this incredible offense. Can you outscore them playing through Josh Hart, even if he has an advantage against an opposing big. And I think the answer like, unless you just get those like 90s style games you got last year is generally going to be no. But to your question, like now, the 40% from 3 I don't think is real because he doesn't, he doesn't want to shoot those shots.

[John Corrales]

Well, we, we can get into the keys here to this matchup because I, I just really think the Celtics are going to throw. Why go from, go away from what works. The Celtics have a lot of matchups that they can throw at, at the Knicks. It's going to be very interesting. I, I don't know exactly how much they're going to show in this, in this final game, but also it could be, it's kind of a must win. So I don't know. You want to, want to dive into those?

[Gavin Shaw]

Yeah, let's get into it. We'll talk. Keys to the game. Keys to a potential series between these two teams. Next. Unlocked on Knicks and locked on Celtics.

[John Corrales]

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[Gavin Shaw]

All right, John, I want to, I want to start here. We, we talk a lot. I think much to the chagrin of my fan base. I'm sure the Celtics fans listening to this, I think people think I'm a doomer when it comes to Nick Celtics. Last year I think I picked Boston in five. So I don't, I don't have a lot of credibility on this topic. But the one area I've, I talked about in a potential match between the two teams that I think is honestly ultimately the reason the Knicks won the series last year. Is they were kind of able to, in a surprising way for two guys who have a ton of playoff experience, bait Jason Tatum and Jaylen Brown into playing one on one, right, by, by putting up some tasty morsels, being like, hey, you want Jalen Brunson on island, go to town. You want Carl Anthony Towns on an island, have a field day, right? And I think that worked incredibly well for the Knicks for a couple different reasons. One, Brunson and Cat are both like, Cat especially are sneaky, solid switch defenders. Cat I actually think is very good at that. And just because his reputation, a lot of people do not recognize it. So they were able to largely force contested jumpers. And like there, there's a world where Tatum and Brown made every one of those in the Knicks lost that series and they shot pretty poorly on them. In the Knicks one two, it puts OG Anunoby and Mikhail Bridges. I think as much as OG in particular is like a elite one on one defender, I think the best way you can use those guys is elite gap helpers. And OG in particular I think is possibly better than anyone in the NBA. That particular skill, right, the ability to shoot in, get a hand on the ball, recover to a three point shooter. But I also don't think Tatum and Brown consistently made the Knicks pay. Like when they had spray options and they could get into those swing, swing sequences that just broke your heart. If you were in a Celtics fan last year and Boston, I mean some of that was they would try and they would miss threes and the Knicks recovered well and they scrambled well. Some of that though is just an unwillingness to make a pass. I'm curious. A year later you talked about Tatum's playmaking looking as clean as ever. Jalen Brown getting a full year of on ball reps, getting to see what every single defense in the NBA throws at him as the number one option. Do you think those two guys are potentially more equipped to make the right play this year? And maybe the, the, even the further upside of that is like more time with Pritchard and Hauser on the floor and you go from like a minus shooters and Holiday and obviously White will have a lot of time out there, but you get a little bit more time on the floor with A to A plus shooters in those two, making them even a little bit harder to guard in those situations.

[John Corrales]

Yeah, the, the spacing is going to be the interesting part of it all because I think more so than the passing ability for Jaylen, it's the ball handling ability that I think has increased. Now he's still prone to the dribbling too much and getting, getting into traffic. And when he, when he plays in a crowd and tries to dribble his way out of it, it's going to be a turnover and a layup on the other end. So that's where his recognition has to come in. And the Celtics have to help him out when, when he gets into those kind of modes to give him an outlet. But generally, I think his ball handling this year, his left hand, all of that has been really great. He's been able to, to get past the initial line of defense. He's able to finish kind of in a crafty way around the rim. It's not just trying to dunk on people. It's, you know, using the rim to block off a defender and finishing on the other side. He's, he's doing a good job with that. And so I think with some additional spacing, he can get to the rim. And if you help, you are helping off of Hauser, you're, you are helping off of Derrick White, you're helping, you know, you're not going to help off of Tatum. And it's, it's just going to be a question of how do you, how do you guard Nimius Keita? And Keita's been amazing at finding gaps and he just from the beginning of the season till now, operating on the baseline, operating in the dunker spot, relocating, figuring out, okay, here's a drive. I'm going to go from the dunker spot. I'm going to rotate up to the middle of the paint and I'm going to get a, a dump off there. When Jaylen gets trapped under the basket, I'm going to hit a little floater like that kind of, those kind of plays are going to help a lot for, for the Celtics, where you didn't have that against the Knicks last year, you didn't have it against the Knicks earlier this season. Like, this is, it's. It's really important to understand that what Kada has become this season has been even a gradual progression throughout the year. So the guy that you remember from the last matchup is not the guy that he is now. And that's a testament to his work and all of that. But he's become a much more dangerous type of player and operating in space. So all of the stuff that you're saying has kind of gets addressed by the progression of these, the Jalen's handle the, the, the K to progression. And yes, having those shooters out there that are willing and able to fire away. And you know Howser catching shoots are deadly and Derek White's shooting numbers this year haven't been great. But because he's been doing a lot of pull up shooting, he's, he's getting back to the kitchen shoot now that Tatum is back. So I think that can, that's going to show up a little bit more too.

[Gavin Shaw]

Yeah, that, that all makes a lot of sense. And I think the vertical spacing is, is a huge factor. As we mentioned, like KP wasn't himself. So you didn't, you didn't have that stretch big. You didn't have around the rim. It was, if I'm remembering correctly, a lot of Drew Holiday in the dunker spot, which is obviously a weapon and he can work from there. But that's different than having like a 6, 11, 7 foot like athletic freak around the basket who seems to have incredible chemistry with Jason Tatum even though they haven't played a ton together. What, what are kind of your biggest questions from a Knicks perspective outside of obviously the starting lineup and how they guard?

[John Corrales]

Yeah, I mean, I think, I think the, the biggest thing is going to be for me, Mitchell Robinson and the. We know what's going to happen when you start, right? We know how the Celtics are going to defend with Kate and all of that. I want to know what happens with Mitchell Robinson and when the Celtics, like, I don't know how the Celtics are going to throw. Are they going to throw like Tatum at the 5? What do you do if Tatum's at the 5? What do you do if Nicola Vuchevic is out there and you run a lot of pick and pop type of stuff and Robinson is pulled away from the rim. Like Rob Robinson to me is what changed that series last year. And you know, he came in and instantly crushed the Celtics on the offensive boards, crushed the Celtics defensively and they, because Porzingis was sick, you didn't really have a super effective floor spacer. You had to rely on Al Horford and there's a lot of Al Horford. So Vuch or even Luca Garza who, who has been amazingly effective for the Celtics in, in spurts. You could throw five minutes, Luca Garza out there and he's, he's a 43 point shooter this year. So I, I'm curious to see how the Mitchell Robinson. Because the bench matchups are going to be. I think where this, this series, this game, the, any, any series against the Celtics might, might be where it gets decided. The minutes, obviously the minutes for Tatum and how that's going to play out. But how, how these bench units, Pritchard coming in, Shireman, Walsh, those guys in, in Vuch who as we're recording this has played one, he'll probably play another game between recording and airing this podcast. So I don't know how he's going to look that that might be the single biggest thing that the Celtics need between now and whenever they they may face the Knicks in a playoff series. Can you get Vuchovic out there and use him as that hub and kind of draw Robinson away or is Robinson going to get a chance to just protect the rim and you get into pull up jumpers and all of that?

[Gavin Shaw]

Yeah, I think it's a great question. The Knicks have not really like taken a page out of the Celtics and other teams books and at least as far as I've noticed and put Mitch on a wing and let him be a rover and they've, they've generally like just had him stick on the opposing big and at times, I mean we saw it last year when he came back against the Celtics and KP hit a few threes on him. Like he can be for someone who's a really good defender overall and is is like similar to Keda in a different way. Right. Because obviously kata this is his first time playing like really big minutes on a great team. Mitch, it was more so because the injury, he got off to a really slow start this year defensively and there are questions of like, all right, maybe it's just been too many injuries, too many miles on him. He's not that guy anymore. And you go from that to last night where in 20 minutes he is like three, five combined steals and blocks against the Hawks and completely takes over that game defensively. The one continued weakness for him is exactly what you say, like stretch fives because he, it's surprising at times because he is like a little inattentive. And it's not even like the Wemby and Chet guys where it's like oh, you have to be wary about them blowing by you. Even, even with guys like boost of it who obviously he can like dribble and get into a post up. But at this point's career he's not going to be doing the cat thing right where it's pump and go and you can't close that hard. But Mitch on handoffs and maybe in a playoff series he'll be a little more attentive like we saw with Okagu yesterday. Like he will just like forget where he is on the floor for a moment somewhere to catch, just have a brain fart and give up a three and like one or two threes in a game from Vucevic or Garza could absolutely swing the series. I do think in the minutes, like if Mitch is on without Cada, like I think Boston's gonna have all the same issues as last year. Keeping off the class, obviously, V's experience, he's strong. I just think Mitch will have an athletic advantage there at this point that will allow him to really hit the glass. And I'm curious in particular, like the minutes where he's on the floor with Deuce McBride, because those are the Knicks two accelerants playing together at once. And I think Deuce is, is just a substantially better player than he was last season. He still has to find that rhythm after missing three months and we'll see if he can do that. But he's developed an ability to get like some self created threes and push pace for the Knicks and I think those two together like could help the Knicks win those minutes. But the flip side of that to me is Boston like the stretch five element that you mentioned. And then also like they're so good at contorting the Knicks defense. I mean every defense but the Knicks defense in particular, putting stress on them. And then you have those young wings where the Knicks try to hide Jalen Brunson. And we saw, I think it was in the second matchup of the season that Boston won, where that was just a major issue with whether it was Walsh or you go like just crashing relentlessly and there's really nothing Jalen Brunson can do about that. So I'm really curious about the offensive rebounding element. And in your opinion, like we can maybe finish on this, like how many, like Ron Harper Jr. Has been great and he's in that mix now. Like how many of those young wings will Missoula trust in the playoff rotation actually play consistently against the Knicks?

[John Corrales]

Yeah, I think Gonzalez is out. I think Harper would be tough. Gonzalez is a 19 year old rookie. I don't think he's going to be in the Eastern Conference, but he was

[Gavin Shaw]

like the best player on the floor for like seven minutes of like that second game. Like he was playing incredible defense on

[John Corrales]

Cat and, and that. And yes. And so I say that knowing that Joe Missoula might, might bust them out, you never know. And one of the hallmarks of this year's Celtics has been the ability for guys to go through stretches of DNPs and then get Minutes and produce like right away it's been kind of like black magicky kind of thing. Like. Like Luca Garza, for example. They traded for Vuch. Vuchovich comes in, plays like 12 games and. And Garza basically DNPs. Then Vucevic gets hurt. Garza comes in, plays great. Just. No, didn't miss a beat. Jordan Walsh, dnps. Then he starts to get back into the rotations. Shireman did the same thing. Like, how do these guys not kind of bristle at the in and out of the lineup? So Gonzalez has been moved to the bench as the season winds down. So there. I don't think he's going to play. But if the Celtics are missing a bunch of shots and you need offensive rebounding, an Ugo, Luca Garza, Baylor Shireman, Jordan Walsh kind of group, some combination of those guys. They're just really intense offensive rebounders. Any combination of those two guys can get in and really change a game with their energy. So I think you're going to see the normal starting five. Peyton Pritchard obviously is six. Vuchevic will have to get minutes at seven. And then your eighth guy is probably going to be Jordan Walsh. You know, big rangy defender. He's going to be the guy that if Mitchell Robinson is. Is going to help off of somebody. If you're going to put him on a wing. Yeah, it's either going to be Jordan Walsh or Baylor Scheireman. And go ahead, guys, I dare you to shoot. And that's what I would do if I was a coach. And they might beat you in a game or two, but you know, it's going to have to be. It's going to be tough. So the. That's a lot of words to get to. I don't know what Joe does because he's. He's been unpredictable. 1. One of the lasting quotes from this season was a practice, like in the middle of the season. We were talking about his rotation. He goes, what rotation? We don't have a rotation. We. You know, we. You don't know who's going to play from game to game. That's why everybody stays ready. We get everybody ready and we go with what the game needs. They've all bought into that. So I can sit here and say, these three guys know. And then after game one or game two, I'll look like an idiot because they play 30 minutes and they help the Celtics win. So that. That. That's. That's Joe Missoula, Celtics.

[Gavin Shaw]

Yeah, we'll see. There's been a little bit of that with Mike Brown as well. And right now he is, he's telegraphing that it is going to be Jordan Clarkson in the in the playoff rotation. Color me skeptical that that lasts. I personally I'm I really hope the Knicks bring back Tyler Kohak because I think he just adds like a zippiness and quick decision making element that they desperately, desperately need on offense and even with the bench unit I think could really elevate them. Jose Alvarado is obviously an option as a pest and an extra ball handler, but right now I think the Knicks like the starting lineup is its own battle the bench. The Celtics have one of the great difference makers in the game and Peyton Pritchard, I think the Knicks have two of them Induce and Mitch and then I'd say the Celtic secondary guys are a little bit more sure things and we're gonna have to see who the Knicks go with and how those guys operate. Landry Shamets had his moments this year hasn't been quite as good of late. But you know what? We're probably going to do this whole podcast again. You know, I don't even want to say that because then the Knicks are going to get swept in the first round. We will maybe do this whole podcast again in a month, but until that time, Knicks fans, be sure to subscribe and check out John Corrales and Locked On Celtics. So you stay ready for that series. Celtics fans, of course. Course you're always welcome to come over and leave a mean comment on the Locked on Nick's YouTube page. Until then, we'll talk to you soon. Unlocked on Nicks and Locked On Celtics.

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[Gavin Shaw]

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[Ross Jackson]

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