Celtics Historic Poor 3-Point Night Not As Damaging As it Seems

The New York Knicks shocked the NBA world on Monday night, upsetting the mighty Boston Celtics in Game 1 of their Eastern Conference Semifinal series.

New York's hounding defense clearly rattled the reigning champs in the 108-105 overtime loss, resulting in some abysmal shooting percentages.

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The Celtics, one of the most prolific 3-point shooting teams ever in the regular season, shot a whopping 60 3-point attempts — making just 15. Jaylen Brown was the most egregious offender, going just 1-for-10 from distance in 44:54 of action.

But maybe Boston's shooting woes aren't quite as dire as they appeared at first blush.

Justin Turnpin of WEEI illuminates some fascinating intel on the nature of those triple takes.

Of the #Celtics 60 three-point attempts:

32 were considered "open" with the defender 4-6 feet away. They shot They shot 7-of-32 (21.9%) on those looks.

24 were considered “wide open” with the closest defender 6+ feet away. They shot 7-of-24 (29.2%) on those looks.
— Justin Turpin (@JustinmTurpin) May 6, 2025

As Turpin points out, 32 of the Celtics' 60 3-point looks were seen to be "open" — i.e. the defender was at least four-to-six feet away. On those attempts, Boston went just 7-of-32 (21.9 percent).

24 of the 60 tries from distance were seen as "wide open" in NBA parlance, with the closest defender being six feet away or further.

The Celtics connected on just 7-of-24 (29.2 percent) of those triple tries.

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All this is to say, once the Celtics' 3-point shooting stabilizes later in this series, they could be in good shape.

Still, the 3-point shooting was something of an Achilles heel in Game 1. Boston leaned a bit too heavily on looks from beyond the arc that weren't falling, rather than seeking to stop scoring droughts with runs to the rim.

The Celtics' overeliance on 3-point shooting was perhaps most glaringly apparent in the third quarter. A whopping 19 of Boston's 20 field goal attempts were triple tries. The Celtics made just seven of those 3-point looks.

In the 108-105 upset loss, the Celtics connected on a scant 15-of-60 shooting from distance. That 3-point shooting made up an inordinate amount of field goal looks, as Boston went just 34-of-97 (35.1 percent) from the floor overall.

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