The Celtics’ 134-125 win over the Hawks was most comfortable as they held the lead from midway through the second quarter through the final buzzer on Saturday.
However, there was still dramatics late in the game.
With 1:25 remaining, Marcus Smart accepted an exception from Hawks star Trey Young when Smart fouled him. The two fought face-to-face before sending each other to the ground.
After several minutes of a long review, the officiating crew ejected Smart and assessed Young with a technical foul.
Sean Wright, the crew chief for Saturday’s game, told Lauren Williams of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution in a pool report that Smart was ejected for “grabbing and taking him down,” adding that Smart had pushed him to the ground. slammed on
Wright said that Young received a technical foul only because “his actions did not rise to the level of ejection” but for “getting up and pointing at Marcus Smart’s face”.
After Smart’s ejection, Young made two free throws to cut the Celtics’ lead to 129–123. Boston could not score on its next trip down the court and allowed Atlanta to grab some offensive rebounds.
Al Horford ended the Hawks’ comeback bid when he blocked John Collins’ shot with 39 seconds remaining, making an easy two points in transition for the Celtics to go up 131–123.
Horford explained what he saw in the play when Smart was ejected and how the Celtics worked through it.
“I mean, I just saw them both go down,” Horford said. “They kept chirping and going down on each other. All we were doing was trying to do damage control and split them up as much as we could.
“We got some adversity out there. Not ideal but as a group, we’ve got to regroup, we’ve got to get it together, and move on. We can’t keep him in those positions and do that, it Puts us in a tough spot but it doesn’t matter what it is, we’ve got to push through and we did that tonight.
Tatum credited the Celtics’ mentality for moving ahead of Smart’s ejection and pulling out the road win.
“We knew it the moment,” Tatum said. “let bygones be bygones. The mindset was to finish the game and we did. We got major milestones. Al found a big block that made a transition bucket and we went from there.
“The carryover of moving into the next game, it was big for us to do that when we had a game on the road.”
Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla was brief in his thoughts on how the team finished Saturday’s game following the ejection.
“It is part of it. You have to navigate in the chaos,” Majulla said.
Smart did not speak to reporters after the game and it remains to be seen whether he will receive any further discipline from the league.
Smart’s ejection on Saturday came two days after co-signing Raptors guard Fred VanVleet’s profanity-laced rant about the league’s operation.
“I don’t know if you guys have seen the Fred VanVleet interview. That’s all I’m going to say,” Smart said late Thursday when asked about some of his mishandling problems. “Obviously, it Tells you I’m not talking out of my butt. And I’m not the only one who feels that way. So I’ll let Fred do all the talking.
When asked how he kept his composure after Saturday’s incident, Young mentioned VanVleet.
“I’m not going to Fred VanVleet these guys,” Young said. “I’m just going to put it out there.”