{"id":599874,"date":"2026-04-11T10:54:12","date_gmt":"2026-04-11T10:54:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/599874\/"},"modified":"2026-04-11T10:54:12","modified_gmt":"2026-04-11T10:54:12","slug":"celtics-tie-nba-record-with-29-3s-clinch-no-2-seed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/599874\/","title":{"rendered":"Celtics tie NBA record with 29 3s; clinch No. 2 seed"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>BOSTON &#8212; The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/nba\/team\/_\/name\/bos\/boston-celtics\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Boston Celtics<\/a> flirted with a piece of NBA history in Friday night&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/nba\/boxscore\/_\/gameId\/401811029\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">144-118 win<\/a> over the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/nba\/team\/_\/name\/no\/new-orleans-pelicans\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">New Orleans Pelicans<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>They didn&#8217;t quite get it, but did lock up something even more valuable: The No. 2 seed in the East in the upcoming playoffs.<\/p>\n<p>The Celtics tied a franchise and NBA record with 29 3-pointers, equaling their total from Oct. 22, 2024 set against the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/nba\/team\/_\/name\/ny\/new-york-knicks\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">New York Knicks<\/a>. The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/nba\/team\/_\/name\/mem\/memphis-grizzlies\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Memphis Grizzlies<\/a> (April 6 vs. Cleveland) and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/nba\/team\/_\/name\/mil\/milwaukee-bucks\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Milwaukee Bucks<\/a> (Dec. 29, 2020 at Miami) also share the record.<\/p>\n<p>Editor&#8217;s Picks<\/p>\n<p>2 Related<\/p>\n<p>When <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/nba\/player\/_\/id\/5175647\/hugo-gonzalez\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Hugo Gonzalez<\/a> tied the mark with 1:20 remaining in the game, the TD Garden crowd began chanting, &#8220;One more three!&#8221; and rose to their feet.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s easy to be aware of it when you hear the crowd and everything,&#8221; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/nba\/player\/_\/id\/4066354\/payton-pritchard\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Payton Pritchard<\/a> said when asked afterward if he was aware how close they were to the record. &#8220;Maybe they&#8217;ve got to be quiet and we can break it one day.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Boston had three chances to break it in the final minute. First, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/nba\/player\/_\/id\/4277951\/luka-garza\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Luka Garza<\/a> passed up on an attempt and drove in for a dunk. After Garza blocked <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/nba\/player\/_\/id\/5144091\/jeremiah-fears\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Jeremiah Fears<\/a>&#8216; layup on the Pelican&#8217;s ensuing possession, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/nba\/player\/_\/id\/4593841\/baylor-scheierman\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Baylor Scheierman<\/a> missed a 3 from the wing off the back rim.<\/p>\n<p>New Orleans&#8217; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/nba\/player\/_\/id\/4869780\/derik-queen\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Derik Queen<\/a> was fouled and hit a pair of free throws with 27 seconds to play, giving the Celtics on final chance. But coach Joe Mazzulla instructed his team to hold the ball and they took a shot clock violation with 1 second remaining.<\/p>\n<p>Eight different Celtics players had at least two 3-pointers in the game. Big man <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/nba\/player\/_\/id\/4397424\/neemias-queta\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Neemias Queta<\/a> even got in on the action for Boston, knocking down his first career 3 to go along with 10 rebounds. Queta&#8217;s 3 caused the entire bench to jump up in celebration.<\/p>\n<p><img class=\" lazyload lazyload\" data-image-container=\".inline-photo\" height=\"320\" width=\"570\"\/>Sam Hauser made a game-high eight 3-pointers in the Celtics&#8217; 144-118 win over the Pelicans on Friday, helping Boston tie the NBA record with 29 3-pointers made in a game.\u00a0Brian Babineau\/NBAE via Getty Images<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/nba\/player\/_\/id\/4065804\/sam-hauser\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Sam Hauser<\/a>, who led Boston with 24 points and eight 3-pointers, called Queta&#8217;s make &#8220;Buttery.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The missed record aside, Pritchard said it was a still a night to savor because of what it said about how far this team has come.<\/p>\n<p>At 55-26, Boston has now achieved at least 50 wins in each of coach Joe Mazzulla&#8217;s first four seasons. And this year&#8217;s team did it after the departures of former starters <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/nba\/player\/_\/id\/3995\/jrue-holiday\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Jrue Holiday<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/nba\/player\/_\/id\/3102531\/kristaps-porzingis\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Kristaps Porzingis<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/nba\/player\/_\/id\/3213\/al-horford\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Al Horford<\/a>, and without <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/nba\/player\/_\/id\/4065648\/jayson-tatum\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Jayson Tatum<\/a> for all but 16 games this season. It&#8217;s something many outsiders predicted would relegate the Celtics to the draft lottery.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;You set back and have an appreciation for the work that we&#8217;ve put in, and the growth that we&#8217;ve made this year to get to this point, and the honor of reaching a top seed when many people didn&#8217;t believe in that,&#8221; said Pritchard, who finished with 21 points, 10 assists and five 3-pointers. &#8220;You take that in and now take a couple of days and get back to work. We&#8217;ve got something else to prove now.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BOSTON &#8212; The Boston Celtics flirted with a piece of NBA history in Friday night&#8217;s 144-118 win over&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":599875,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,85],"class_list":["post-599874","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-basketball","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-basketball","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/599874","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=599874"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/599874\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/599875"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=599874"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=599874"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=599874"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}