{"id":534011,"date":"2026-03-13T16:13:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-13T16:13:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/534011\/"},"modified":"2026-03-13T16:13:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-13T16:13:08","slug":"celtics-rise-in-bleacher-reports-latest-nba-power-rankings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/534011\/","title":{"rendered":"Celtics Rise In Bleacher Report’s Latest NBA Power Rankings"},"content":{"rendered":"

Celtics Rise In Bleacher Report’s Latest NBA Power Rankings<\/a> originally appeared on NESN<\/a>. Add NESN as a Preferred Source by clicking here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Only the San Antonio Spurs and Oklahoma City Thunder ranked higher than the Boston Celtics<\/a> in Bleacher Report’s new NBA power rankings, published Friday by BR’s Andy Bailey.<\/p>\n

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That’s right, the Celtics rose to the No. 3 spot after being No. 4 last week, despite Boston losing two games this week to the Spurs and Thunder, both contests coming on the road.<\/p>\n

“The Boston Celtics went 2-2 this week,” Bailey wrote<\/a>. “They’re still in second place in the East. Whatever.”<\/p>\n

“The real story for this team (and one of the biggest ones for any team this entire season) was the return of Jayson Tatum.”<\/p>\n

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“And though some of his possessions have looked a bit stiffer than the pre-Achilles tear Tatum we’ve come to know over his nearly a decade in the spotlight, it’s obvious that he’ll be a thoroughly helpful player by the postseason,” Bailer continued. “That makes Boston perhaps the most interesting potential Oklahoma City Thunder challenger in the league.”<\/p>\n

“Sure, Boston lost to OKC on Thursday, but Tatum missed that game, and the Celtics kept it close without him,” Bailey added. “If, by the time we reach a Finals matchup between these two times, Tatum is back to being able to play 30-35 minutes consistently, Boston is capable of winning that seven-game series.”<\/p>\n

The Celtics are now 43-23 on the season. Their next three games are at home: Saturday against the Washington Wizards, Monday against the Phoenix Suns, and Wednesday against the Golden State Warriors.<\/p>\n

More NBA: Bleacher Report Points To Three Offseason Trade Targets For Celtics<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Celtics Rise In Bleacher Report’s Latest NBA Power Rankings originally appeared on NESN. Add NESN as a Preferred…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":534012,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[434],"tags":[164335,19829,1222,49,48,8217,459,3555,6002,2696,82,88791,8027],"class_list":["post-534011","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-andy-bailey","tag-bleacher-report","tag-boston-celtics","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-golden-state-warriors","tag-nba","tag-oklahoma-city-thunder","tag-phoenix-suns","tag-san-antonio-spurs","tag-sports","tag-tatum","tag-washington-wizards"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/534011","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=534011"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/534011\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/534012"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=534011"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=534011"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=534011"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}