The replacements trying to fill Marcus Smart’s shoes
The Replacements
With Kemba out for load management and Marcus Smart and Payton Pritchard hurt, Jeff Teague got the start. And he looked, very Jeff Teaguey. Some good stuff, some unnecessary pump fakes, and 0-3 from the field. Tremont Waters got some early minutes and looked fine, except when he was missing all 5 of his shots. Carsen Edwards came in and stroked a confident 3 pointer, and not much else. Oh, and none of them had any hope of stopping Fox, Heild, or Haliburton.
Timelordy
I am once again enjoying the Rob Williams III experience. The blocks are a lot of fun. He also has 3 rebounds, a steal, and an assist. He still struggles with court awareness at times but these are the moments to learn that kind of stuff through experience. He’s contributing enough to have enough leash to work through that stuff. By the way, Theis and Thompson have looked good at points in this game too.
Slop-sloppy Joes
This game feels like an early February game against the Kings. Boston is playing down the the helter-skelter pace and style that Sacramento wants to play. Neither team is playing good defense and it has been a shootout so far. The key will be settling things down and letting our players out-execute this team in the 2nd half. Feels like they can do that, but this team is also prone to mental let downs in situations like this too.