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Late in the fourth quarter, after Kelly Olynyk drove the lane and dunked with no defender in sight, CSNNE announcer Brian Scalabrine best summed up tonight's 114-97 Celtics win: "The Kings are playing defense like a summer league game, like it's a charity event. I don't think they know it's a real NBA game."
The Celtics had four players finish with at least 20 points -- Isaiah Thomas, Kelly Olynyk, Jae Crowder, and Avery Bradley -- as part of the destruction of Sacramento's wannabe defense.
As part of his 21-point performance in a "revenge game" against his former team, Thomas made a spectacular play in the first half, slithering his way into the paint, around DeMarcus Cousins, before laying the ball up high off the backboard. Boston had a dominant +33.2 Net Rating in Thomas' 34 minutes.
Cousins was locked down and visibly frustrated, finishing with just 16 points on 4-of-17 shooting in 25 minutes. And without Cousins, the Kings are hopeless, so the Celtics took advantage, especially early.
The Celtics opened up the first quarter with a ferocious 32-17 run, led by the continued hot shooting of Avery Bradley, who even struck a pose after he drained his fourth and final triple of the game.
Old friend Rajon Rondo was ejected in the third quarter after staring down referee Bill Kennedy for an uncomfortably long time. He also struggled to generate consistent offense, with 5 points, 8 assists, and 4 turnovers in 24 minutes.
Olynyk's dunk was his highlight of the night, but he also drained a number of threes to sustain Boston's lead in arguably his best performance of the season, with a high of 21 points.
Celtics assisted on 34 of 40 makes, the 3rd-highest percentage of assisted makes in the NBA this year (85%). The high is GSW (86.9% vs DEN).
— Kevin O'Connor (@KevinOConnorNBA) December 4, 2015
The tweet above is a rather extraordinary stat for the Celtics. Had it not been for a final-minute layup by Terry Rozier, the Celtics would've set a season-high in the NBA on assisted made field goals. But their 34-of-40 performance of assisted makes is still impressive, though it came against the defenseless Kings.
The Celtics are now 11-8, and will return to the United States with two tough games against the Spurs and Pelicans.