5 Takeaways: Celtics dominate Hawks in bell-to-bell victory

While the final score may say otherwise, the Celtics painted one of their best performances of the season to throttle Atlanta. After an emotional comeback in Miami on Thursday night, it was all the more impressive how dominant Boston looked on Saturday night. 

Boston threw its best punches in the first half, and they connected in the tune of 11 second quarter threes and an eventual 43-point lead. 

Here are five takeaways from the 132-106 win… 

It was a big weekend for Jaylen Brown in Atlanta, and he certainly played like it. 

On Friday, Brown was honored at Wheeler High School as his No. 0 jersey was retired in a ceremony. As a senior, Brown led Wheeler to a Georgia High School Association Class 6A State Championship before heading off to Cal as a five-star recruit. 

“Pretty cool. Pretty surreal,” Brown said at Celtics shootaround on Saturday morning.

Brown looked like he was right at home against the Hawks, putting on a dominant 41-point performance in just under 30 minutes. 

Brown’s latest MVP-like performance also put him in some historic company as he joined Steph Curry and Klay Thompson as the only players to score 40 in under 30 minutes on two different occasions. 

He also became just the third player in the play-by-play era to attempt 13 field goals and six free throws in a single quarter with his opening 18-point showing in the first. 

Brown may not be fully in the MVP conversation yet, but nights like this makes you wonder how much longer until he’s a more popular pick to win the award. 

With Payton Pritchard missing his first game of the season, Derrick White became the main ball handler for Boston — and the role fit like a glove. 

It was honestly one of White’s more impressive performances of the year, and he only attempted four shots. The guard showcased his passing ability with a season-high 12 assists to fuel the offense in a different way than he normally does. He was just two short of matching his career high of 14. 

White also did the little things well against the Hawks, snagging three steals and a block. 

Sam Hauser is usually pretty consistent in his role as a Celtic. Every night he’ll usually knock down a couple threes, maybe he’ll flash with a couple of inside looks as well. But on a handful of nights every year Hauser gets red hot, and then Boston becomes virtually unbeatable. 

Saturday was one of those nights. 

Hauser was on fire from the jump, hitting seven triples in the first half and finishing with 10 on the night. His 10 makes matches a career high from deep, and was just one shy of matching Marcus Smart’s franchise record of 11. 

Hauser was definitely stretching to hit that 11th three deeper into the fourth than was probably necessary. The forward was 2-for-11 from deep in the fourth, and was eventually pulled before he could possibly hit the record. 

The Kristaps Porzingis injury saga didn’t end when he was traded from Boston last summer. It’s still certainly going on in Atlanta and it doesn’t look like it’s coming to any resolution anytime soon. 

Porzingis has played in just 17 games this season as he continued to deal with his POTS diagnosis that all but sidelined him for the Celtics playoff run last season. On Saturday, he was ruled out with left-achilles tendonitis. 

It’s certainly an interesting sliding door moment for Boston. 

If the Celtics opted to keep Porzingis and either take the second-apron penalties or trade another contract off the roster they would almost certainly be hearing a lot of negativity right now about Porzingis' availability. 

Even if Brad Stevens was forced to unload Porzingis, in hindsight the move has paid off despite the lack of a return. 

With the Celtics officially reaching the midway point of the regular season on Saturday night, it’s a good time to reflect on how impressive this season has been to this point. 

Expectations varied for this team in October. Some viewed them as a tank candidate, some viewed them as a play-in squad that could make a little noise in the first round and others thought they should be in that middle tier of the Eastern Conference. 

But now at the midpoint, Boston sits at 26-15 and firmly in second place in the East. There probably aren't many media pundits who predicted that. You could even ask Stevens and Joe Mazzulla that they would be in second place in mid-January and they would see that as a reach. 

Everything has seemingly worked for this Celtics team so far, and with Brown playing like a surefire MVP candidate and the eventual return of Jayson Tatum looming, this team is capable of once again playing deep into May. 

While Boston is probably a move or two and a healthy Tatum away from truly being a title contender, there will be moves for Stevens to make in the coming weeks. 

And what better way to open the second half with a national T.V. matchup with the No. 1 seed Detroit Pistons on Monday night.