10 takeaways as Jayson Tatum, Celtics begin title defense with preseason win over Nuggets

While Friday’s game didn’t exactly tell us much about the two powerhouse franchises that played in it, basketball (in some form) is back.

The Celtics opened their 2024-25 title defense (or rather, their 2024-25 attack of a new goal, as Joe Mazzulla would prefer to put it) with a 107-103 preseason victory in Abu Dhabi over the Nuggets.

Here are the takeaways.

1. Friday’s contest was precisely what you would expect from a game on October 4 between two teams who have ambitions of playing deep into June.

The starters played limited minutes at a relatively low level of intensity – so low, in fact, that Nuggets star Jamal Murray (who played 15 minutes in the first half) was already wearing street clothes late in the fourth quarter.

Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum were present but largely unimpactful in the final result. Al Horford was not accounted for and thus was less impactful, but only slightly.

Nikola Jokic torched a Celtics defense that will have trouble even when they put everything they have toward defending him, which they certainly did not do on Friday.

Down the stretch, even the scorekeepers seemed to be in preseason mode. The Nuggets appeared to have committed a bad foul up one in the final minute to send the Celtics to the line with a chance to take the lead, but after a discussion with both coaches, an official confirmed that the arena scoreboard was wrong: The Celtics were actually up by one, and JD Davison’s free-throw attempts were actually an opportunity to go up three (Davison sank both).

Still, the Celtics looked like themselves at times, and not just because of all the familiar faces. They moved the ball and created a staggering 61 3-point attempts. They crashed the glass. They fed Payton Pritchard when he engulfed himself in flames in the first half.

So while Friday’s game didn’t exactly tell us much about the two powerhouse franchises that played in it, basketball (in some form) is back.

2. Tatum spent time in the offseason reworking his 3-point shot with his trainer Drew Hanlen, and early returns are positive. He shot 3-for-7 from behind the arc on Friday, but much more importantly, he appears to have smoothed out the creases in his form that were mocked by everyone from TikTokers to his own star teammate. The new look jumper looks cleaner, far quicker, and more repeatable.

3. Early returns on Jaylen Brown’s new muscle, meanwhile, were inconclusive, but he certainly is still very athletic.

Brown joined Russell Westbrook in addressing the Abu Dhabi crowd before the game in both English and Arabic, which drew loud cheers from the assembled crowd (as well as some compliments from viewers online).

Brown finished with eight points in 19 minutes, along with two steals, two rebounds, and one incredibly loud block as a help defender.

4. As is often the case in games that the Celtics only nominally care about, Payton Pritchard was the best player on the floor for lengthy stretches.

That’s not a knock on Pritchard, to be clear – he has proven repeatedly that he belongs in lineups with Tatum and Brown more than he does in lineups with Drew Peterson and Neemias Queta.

But for the Celtics – who are competitive and want to win every game but who also will likely have plenty of games this season that simply don’t matter as much as the playoffs – Pritchard is absolutely essential. He’s as capable of scoring 20-plus starting in place of Jrue Holiday or Derrick White as he is coming off the bench and burying a couple of huge 3-pointers in a playoff game.

On Friday, Pritchard finished with 21 points, shooting 6-for-12 from behind the arc.

5. Xavier Tillman will be a key contributor this season as the Celtics wait for Kristaps Porzingis to come back. Tillman excels defending the pick-and-roll as a big man, with quick feet and a strong frame that allows him to both move and absorb contact.

In Game 3 of the Finals, Tillman buried a corner 3-pointer that felt like it carried outsized importance – not only did it push the Celtics’ second-half lead to 13 in a do-or-die Game 3 for the Mavericks, it showed Dallas that even a player like Tillman could space the floor on a 3-point juggernaut like Boston.

On Friday, Tillman went 2-for-3 from behind the arc on corner triples. We won’t belabor the point here at the risk of overreacting to the smallest possible sample size (one preseason game), but if Tillman can stretch the floor, it not only changes the outlook for the first part of the season without Porzingis, but it also gives the Celtics another very playable two-way option for its deep bench.

6. The Celtics lost an interesting challenge early: Derrick White appeared to get fouled in transition as he threw the ball out of bounds, and the officials called the out-of-bounds. Mazzulla challenged unsuccessfully.

From the NBA’s press release on its new replay review rules, officials will now consider both the distance between the uncalled foul and the out-of-bounds violation under review, and the time elapsed between the uncalled foul and the out-of-bounds violation under review.

Since Mazzulla lost the challenge, the officials presumably either decided that A) White wasn’t fouled or B) that the foul took place after the bad pass. Our guess is the former, but it might be an indicator that the new replay review will need to be extra conclusive.

7. Jordan Walsh’s defense was interesting: The second-year forward stood new Nuggets guard Russell Westbrook up on a drive and broke up a transition pass in the first half, and he forced a jump ball and absolutely smothered a post move by Nuggets forward Vlatko Čančar in the second.

The second year will be important for Walsh, who didn’t exactly cover himself in glory at Summer League. Still, in a defensive-oriented role, the hyper-athletic 20-year-old could shine – he has always been a disruptive defender at every level, and his NBA future will likely be built on that end, even if it hinges on a more consistent 3-pointer (Walsh was an unconvincing-but-not-disastrous 2-for-6 from behind the arc).

8. Welcome to the league, Baylor Scheierman: The rookie sandwiched a turnover with an airball and a corner 3 that hit the top of the backboard in his debut. He finished 0-for-3 from the floor.

9. Kevin Garnett was in attendance on Friday.

The NBA had a big delegation at the game, which makes sense given the league’s major financial interest in continuing to build ties with the United Arab Emirates. According to ESPN’s well-sourced reporter Brian Windhorst, the NBA has hemorrhaged revenue from China in recent years – a money hole that the UAE is capable of playing an instrumental role in filling.

Given that the Celtics went up for sale over the summer, and given the massive success of the government-backed City Football Group that owns Manchester City in the Premier League, a logical follow-up question to a showdown between the Nuggets and Celtics in Abu Dhabi is whether a group like the City Football Group could become the Celtics’ new owners and build a dynastic Manchester-City-style team in the NBA with little concern for pesky issues like a “second apron” or a “luxury tax bill.”

Windhorst reported that won’t be the case: The NBA restricts sovereign wealth funds to just 20 percent ownership, and there are no plans to alter that rule right now.

10. The Celtics and Nuggets tip off once more in Abu Dhabi on Sunday at 10 a.m. for those of us in Eastern Standard Time before traveling back to the United States to finish off their slate of preseason games.