The Boston Celtics entered Wednesday’s recreation towards the Magic with a 33-7 away report. A win would have tied them with the 2015-16 Warriors (34-7) for the best road record in NBA history.
As a substitute of gunning for the milestone, Joe Mazzulla determined to rest all his starters, and 6 of his high seven gamers, because the C’s suffered a 96-76 loss to the Magic. The 76 factors have been the bottom scoring output by a Celtics staff since Jan. 2021 and the third-lowest by any staff this season.
On the second evening of a back-to-back, Boston was justified in prioritizing participant well being forward of its NBA title protection. After the loss, Mazzulla stated his intention was to not consider which of his second- and third-stringers may contribute to a playoff run however to relaxation his key gamers.
“One recreation would not try this,” Mazzulla said of Baylor Scheierman, Neemias Queta, Drew Peterson and different bench-warmers. “It is a complete physique of labor over the course of video games, practices, exercises, movie session — there wasn’t one factor they may do tonight to impression what they’ve performed over the course of the season.”
Whereas the Celtics will not end the 2024-25 season as the best highway staff ever, they make a compelling case for probably the most dominant. Per NBC Sports, they outscored groups on the highway by 9.3 factors this season, which might have been considerably greater if not for the 20-point loss to Orlando on Tuesday.
Solely the 1971-72 Lakers (11.3) and 2024-25 Thunder (9.6) maintained greater highway factors differentials. The Thunder’s margin may drop of their closing two highway video games towards the Jazz and Pelicans, particularly in the event that they take the Celtics route and relaxation all their key gamers.
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