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The defending NBA champion Boston Celtics are scorching hot heading through the last few weeks of the 2024-25 regular season. Boston has won 16-of-18. Tomorrow night, they head to Madison Square Garden to take on the New York Knicks at 7:30 PM ET on TNT. The Knicks have gone 7-3 in their last 10 games and won six-of-seven at home.
This is the fourth and final matchup in a season series between the two long-time rivals, and the Celtics have dominated this season. Boston has won the first three contests this season by an average of 21 points. That includes a 131-104 victory in New York in early February.
Let’s review each team’s recent performance while previewing this matchup and making a Celtics @ Knicks NBA pick.
Boston has a league-best 32-7 road record. The Celtics have won eight straight and 16-of-17 away from TD Garden. Those 32 road wins are tied for the most in Celtics franchise history. They can tie the NBA record of 34 victories away from home, set by the 2015-16 Golden State Warriors.
Coach Joe Mazzulla’s squad, currently 58-20 overall, is firmly entrenched in second place in the Eastern Conference, four games behind the Cleveland Cavaliers. The Celtics are coming off their NBA-leading 18th championship, and the franchise is looking to win back-to-back titles for the first time since 1968-69.
The Celtics won two-of-three at home last week, concluding the short homestand with an easy 124-90 victory over the Washington Wizards last night without Jayson Tatum and Kristaps Porzingis. Payton Pritchard had 20 points and 7 assists off the bench to lead Boston, followed by Derrick White with 19 points, and Sam Hauser had 18 points and 8 rebounds.
While at home, the Celtics set an NBA record for 3-pointers made in a single season, passing the 2022-23 Warriors during a 123-103 victory over the visiting Phoenix Suns Friday night. The team has made and attempted the most 3-pointers in a single season. Tatum leads the Celtics and is fifth in the NBA in scoring with 26.9 per game, to go with a team-leading 8.7 rebounds and 6.0 assists. He’s followed by Brown at 22.5 PPG.
Boston has made mincemeat of the Knicks in their three previous matchups this season, averaging 127 points in three dominant wins. Tatum is averaging 34 points against New York this season, including a 40-point output at Madison Square Garden in a 131-104 blowout.
The Knicks are a distant third in the Eastern Conference. At 50-28, they are 8.0 games behind Boston. Despite posting back-to-back 50-win campaigns for the first time in 30 years, the season has a disappointing feel as the Knicks were hoping to close the gap with Boston after a busy offseason. Instead, the Celtics feel further away than before, and the Cavaliers have blown right by them.
The Knicks have won 7-of-10 coming into tomorrow night’s contest. That includes two wins over the weekend. Karl-Anthony Towns had 30 points and 11 rebounds, OG Anunoby added 24 points, and Mikal Bridges contributed 20 points in a 121-105 victory at the Atlanta Hawks Saturday night. That same trio led New York in a 112-98 win over the Suns at home last night. Anunoby had a team-high 32 points while Towns had 19 points and 13 rebounds and Bridges scored 22 points. More importantly, All-Star guard Jalen Brunson returned from an ankle injury to add 15 points and 6 assists.
Brunson missed exactly a month with the injury, and the Knicks went just 9-6 in his absence. He leads the team and is close behind Tatum in scoring at 26.1 points a game. He’s also eighth in the league with 7.4 assists. Towns is averaging 24.3 points, and his 12.8 rebounds per game are good for second in the NBA this season. New York also got back guard Mile McBride recently, giving coach Tom Thibodeau a fully healthy squad going into the last week of the regular season and the playoffs.
Even with Brunson back, the Knicks are still decidedly underdogs against the Celtics tomorrow night. New York has shown nothing in its three previous contests with Boston to indicate a better performance is coming.
One player who could make a difference is Anunoby, who has shown up recently. The seventh-year forward averages 18.1 points on the year, but he has gone for 27.6 points in the team’s last 10 games.
Look for the Celtics to continue their grip on this season series and complete the sweep, but Onunoby should also continue his hot recent run and score more than 25 points for New York.
Brian has been writing about sports professionally for 25 years, specializing in the NFL, MLB, NHL, NBA, men's college basketball and football, and soccer. He covered high school, collegiate and professional sports in the Baltimore-Washington metropolitan area for two decades. His written work has appeared in several print and online publications since 1999.