The Boston Celtics may have lost the game on Sunday, but Al Horford insists that his teammates are not losing their composure over the antics of Golden State Warriors big man Draymond Green.
Green has been involved in some testy exchanges over the first two games of the NBA Finals including two in the first half of Sunday’s Game 2. The Warriors big man was hit with a technical foul after getting into a shoving match with Celtics forward Grant Williams early in the first quarter, and was nearly ejected after he and Jaylen Brown got tangled up on another play and Green narrowly avoided a second technical.
After the Warriors pulled away for a 107-88 victory, Celtics forward Al Horford spoke out about the effect that Green’s physical play and on-court antics have on his team.
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Celtics Remaining Focused, Ignoring Green
Following the game, Horford was asked what effect Green’s play was having on the Celtics and whether it was breaking their composure. He insisted that it meant nothing to them.
“Nah, no impact,” he said.
Al Horford on whether or not “dust-ups” with Draymond Green had an impact on the Celtics composure 👀
Brown said that his team failed to match Golden State’s intensity in Game 2, but also bemoaned that Green was not assessed a second technical foul for their dust-up. Brown added that his team has come to expect that kind of intensity and toeing-the-line from Green.
“That’s what Draymond Green does,” he said, via Yahoo Sports. “He’ll do whatever it takes to win. He’ll pull you, he’ll grab you, he’ll try to muck the game up, because that’s what he does for their team. It’s nothing to be surprised about. Nothing I’m surprised about. He raised his physicality to try to stop us, and we’ve got to raise ours.”
Horford Comes Back to Earth
After Horford for 26 points in Game 1 on 9-of-12 shooting, including 6-of-8 from behind the three-point line, he came crashing back to earth in Sunday’s Game 2. He made just one of his four field goals, scoring two points and registering a minus-15 in the plus-minus column.
It was a performance that Green had predicted. After Game 1, the Warriors veteran had hinted that the performance of Horford and Celtics teammates Marcus Smart and Derrick White was something of a fluke and didn’t expect them to replicate it in Game 2.
The Warriors needed an ‘attitude adjustment’ in Game 2. Draymond Green set the tone immediately
“They hit 21 threes, and Marcus Smart and Al Horford and Derrick White combined for 15 of them,” Green said. “The guys are good shooters, but they combined for, what, 15 out of 8. Smart, 7, 8, 15-for-23. My math right? 8, 7, and 8. Yeah, that’s 23, right. Yeah, 15-for-23 from those guys, eh, you know, so, we’ll be fine.”
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Celtics Star Issues Strong Statement on Warriors’ Draymond Green