REFRAME is a series in which we parse great photos of sports moments to find how those moments fit into historic context. In this episode, we examine the Celtics' opening-night quest to break the NBA three-point record ... that ended with them merely tying the record because they missed like a dozen three-pointer in a row.
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00:00Every sport has a clear, ultimate objective of winning.
00:04But, in every sport, we keep a record of so many other things besides and beneath winning.
00:10Stats.
00:11And sometimes, when the ultimate objective is no longer in play,
00:15like when a game or a season has already been decided, or it just doesn't matter anymore,
00:19we focus instead on the stats.
00:22And sometimes, if a statistical record sits within reach,
00:25a game that was once focused on that objective of winning starts to look very different and very bizarre.
00:31And that's what's happening in this picture.
00:33This is a picture of opening night of the 24-25 season between the Celtics and Knicks.
00:38It is garbage time, as you can tell by the fact that the Knicks have three rookies on the floor.
00:42Yeah, I don't know who these guys are.
00:44That's Tyler Kolek, Ariel Huckporty, and Paco Mbadie, all playing their first ever NBA game.
00:49Good for them.
00:50It's garbage time.
00:51Peyton Pritchard is a bench player for the Celtics.
00:54He's shooting a wide-open three.
00:56There's like a minute and a half left, I think you can see in the corner.
00:59The defense doesn't look particularly good.
01:01It's a wide-open three.
01:03And yet, look at the crowd.
01:05Everyone's fucking into it.
01:06Yeah, even Henry Louis Gates down here.
01:09Henry Louis Gates is captivated.
01:10He's like up on his feet, captivated.
01:12And Kai Sanat.
01:13And Kai Sanat.
01:14Other people have their phones out.
01:15During this game, with about eight or nine minutes left,
01:18the Celtics tied the NBA record for most three-pointers ever hit in a game.
01:22Right.
01:23Insane.
01:24So they spent the next eight or nine minutes attempting to beat the record
01:28for most three-pointers ever hit in a game.
01:30And this is Peyton Pritchard taking one of those attempts.
01:33Doesn't go in.
01:34Over the course of the final eight or so minutes of the game,
01:37they missed 12 in a row.
01:39So the Celtics, to be clear, failed to break the NBA record for three-pointers in a game.
01:44They did not hit 30.
01:45They only hit 29.
01:46They mashed a record.
01:48And failed to break it.
01:50Which if they had done that, and that was the night, success.
01:53Right.
01:54If number 29 came late in the game.
01:56You're now in the record books.
01:57Five seconds left.
01:58We matched the record and we won the game.
02:01Yes.
02:02The fact that this played out how it did, failure.
02:05The fact that this played out how it did is almost what created the failure.
02:09Because, and I can tell you, I watched this whole game.
02:12I am ashamed to admit, looking at this picture, a very big Knicks fan.
02:15And this was opening night.
02:17But you only watch for Dolan.
02:19Yeah.
02:20And he wasn't even there, so.
02:22The Celtics achieved their feat of 29 three-pointers in like 40 minutes
02:27by playing the most elegant, effective offense I have genuinely ever seen in my life.
02:32They played beautiful, high assist, free-flowing, screening, intelligent basketball.
02:38Offense that would win you a championship.
02:40Offense that, yeah, would win you a championship.
02:42This was ring night.
02:43And that got them to 29 threes.
02:45And then the thought entered their heads of, oh, we almost have a record.
02:49Well, we're here.
02:50And the game was decided, so they didn't really have to play particularly effectively.
02:54And then they just played idiot basketball.
02:56It was just heaving threes.
02:58All of that flow was gone.
03:00All of the sharing and all of the camaraderie out the window.
03:04That has got to feel really good because it's a little bit like,
03:09even though you keep using the word that they failed, Will,
03:14but I think they didn't go into game one looking to break the NBA record for threes.
03:20They just found themselves in that place to do that.
03:24So it becomes almost like a bonus round.
03:26It's like a side quest or like when you're playing Metal Gear Solid and they're like,
03:31great job.
03:32You successfully extracted the hostage.
03:35See if you can find the other five gold bars that went missing before you leave.
03:41Someone is whispering that in Peyton Pritchard's ear right now.
03:45I do think you describe that as fun and it's fun,
03:48but also that creates a weird amount of pressure that you would usually associate
03:52with a playoff game where Peyton Pritchard is taking this shot with the weight
03:57of knowing that if he hits it, he will make history and the whole crowd will go nuts
04:02and it'll be a momentous thing and people will be watching this highlight forever.
04:05And I think that's why you missed 12 in a row is because they all come with that.
04:09They're all trying to be the answer to a trivia question.
04:11Exactly.
04:12I could see that argument if we were talking about like a home run record where people
04:15are showing up to the stadium and being like, tonight's the night we're going to see it,
04:18you know, or like every game it doesn't happen.
04:20Then the next game there's a little bit more pressure of like tonight's the night
04:23it's going to happen, whereas they walked into TD Garden being like,
04:27let's just open up the season strong and then found themselves in the third quarter
04:30being like, oh shit, we could do this.
04:32Maybe we should.
04:34Is that really like pressure?
04:36Not a perfect equivalent, but this is almost like if you're at a bowling alley
04:40and someone is like on their way to bowling at 300 and then you watch them succeed
04:47in bowling at 300, but then the screen's like, ah, here's some more frames.
04:51Can you keep it up? Can you keep going?
04:53And it's like, well, I achieved the thing I was trying to do, which is hard to do.
04:57It's hard to win a basketball game.
04:58It's hard to have it in hand with nine minutes to play.
05:01Side quest.
05:02Side quest.
05:03For this to be like a coordinated team effort.
05:05At some point, someone had to be like, we've won the game.
05:09Fuck it mode.
05:10Someone had to explicitly lay out the game plan, right?
05:14I just know it wasn't the coach.
05:15Like it was not Joe Mazzulla telling them, hey guys, you have 29 three pointers.
05:20Let's try and break the record.
05:21Cause Joe Mazzulla is not on that sideline talking about normal stuff.
05:25He's quoting the town.
05:28He's the man is intense.
05:30He has a sort of military quasi religious presence on the sideline.
05:34Okay.
05:35He says really goth stuff.
05:37So if not him, then someone at some point had to step up on the sideline
05:42and be like, we need to go for this.
05:43Right.
05:44I think it's an assistant.
05:45I think it's an assistant or like an injured player.
05:47Like Chris steps for Zingas is there in the suit.
05:49Yeah.
05:50And I think he's got, you know, they get the score sheets printed out.
05:52And you're talking about lurch.
05:54He's a tall fella.
05:58And he was like, Hey guys, I don't know if you guys have seen this box score,
06:02but you guys are about to make history.
06:04If you just keep shooting those threes,
06:05the final three minutes of the game passed without the Celtics attempting a
06:09two pointer.
06:10Yeah.
06:11Okay.
06:12Like, because there was such intentionality,
06:14that is why it feels like a failure in my mind.
06:17If it was like, we matched the record,
06:19we want to rest our starters and we're just going to like play the clock.
06:23We're going to control the ball.
06:24We'll take an easy shot if it's there.
06:26Then they would have broken the record.
06:27I'm serious.
06:28Like this is like,
06:29when you think about breathing too much and it starts to get a little awkward,
06:33the Celtics playing like the Celtics and running their sets and playing Celtics
06:38basketball that won them a championship generate a ton of threes.
06:41It's not an accident that this team did this.
06:43What changed is that they stopped playing Celtics basketball and just started
06:46jacking up threes like a bad team.
06:48I honestly think if what you described happened,
06:51they just played regular old garbage time ball.
06:53Yeah.
06:54They would have broken the record.
06:55There's no reason to have pressure in this moment yet.
06:57Exactly.
06:58Piled on pressure.
06:59Exactly.
07:00What this has been making me wonder is if this is the best example of this
07:03phenomenon of someone matching a record very quickly,
07:07like on pace to just blow the record away,
07:10but failing to actually break the record and that sort of surplus of time
07:14they've been given.
07:16Obviously there's only one person to ask about this.
07:20With the Celtics in their season opener,
07:22able to tie but not break the NBA record for most three-pointers in a game,
07:26it harkens back to the 2019 Minnesota baseball twins who entered game 162,
07:31but a mere 16 total bases shy of matching the single season record of
07:362,832 set 16 years earlier by the Red Sox.
07:40Looked like a lock when they got nine of the 16 in the first inning,
07:43and they recorded their 16th total base of the game by the sixth inning to
07:47match the 0-3 Bo Sox.
07:49All they needed was a single single in any of the final three innings to pass
07:53them.
07:54And they couldn't.
07:57With three homers in the game, however,
07:59they did edge by one the Yanks from the season prior for the single season
08:03record in that department.
08:05Only for the Braves to do four years later to them with homers what they'd
08:08themselves done with total bases.
08:11I guess the thing that that has me thinking about is when in 2024,
08:17Ravens bills.
08:18Derek Henry was at 196 rushing yards.
08:22He had already matched.
08:23So he would have set the record for most 200 yard rushing games in a career.
08:27He's at 196.
08:29They give him the ball picks up one.
08:31Give him the ball again.
08:33He picks up to third down.
08:35They get him in the ball picks up one more yard,
08:38but it was a reception.
08:40Oh,
08:41so is he like dipping his toe over the line of scrimmage and be like,
08:45that's like a Peyton Pritchard is pump faking here.
08:47And he's like, sure.
08:48No, you know what?
08:49This isn't the one.
08:50It was like shoot the ball because like in my mind,
08:52it's like this is it's it's the coaches being like,
08:55we're going to keep you on the game plan.
08:56You're still in the game.
08:58We have other backs who could do this,
08:59who are younger and we don't need to worry about the injury risk or whatever
09:03like that,
09:04but we're going to throw you the ball instead of hand it off to you one more
09:07time to pick up a yard like Derek Henry can just take a hand off in the
09:12backfield, fall forward, pick up a yard and be at 200.
09:15It's tough when it's an individual thing.
09:17That is the nice thing about the Celtic situation is that the whole team gets
09:22to participate and the entire weight of the experience isn't placed on one
09:27single person,
09:28you know,
09:29like they can share the blame in a way that makes it like,
09:31don't worry about it.
09:32Instead of like,
09:33damn bro,
09:34you missed eight threes at the end of the game all in a row when you could
09:37have set the single game record to be fair.
09:39That is the J.
09:40R.
09:41Smith experience on the Knicks.
09:42It's him gunning for a record by himself.
09:45Once the Knicks figured out what was going on,
09:48do you think there was a moment where they were sort of the villain,
09:51the inverse of this,
09:52where they were like,
09:53fuck,
09:54we lost this game,
09:55but we have got to keep them from getting this,
09:56uh,
09:57this record.
09:58Apparently not.
09:59No,
10:00they continue to play poor defense.
10:01It looks like they're doing like a substitution on the fly off the bench
10:05with the guy.
10:06Yeah.
10:08Where are you going,
10:09bud?
10:10Looks like he is a streaker.
10:12Looks like he just ran onto the court.
10:14The defense had been playing so poorly.
10:16He was trying a different stealth approach.
10:18He's not going to see me coming up on him.
10:21God,
10:22you know,
10:23you're making me realize what would be the,
10:25the Knicks best option here is to just foul intentionally every time
10:29down.
10:30Don't let them dad's really good.
10:31Forget defending the threes.
10:33Cause clearly that wasn't working for them.
10:35Yeah.
10:36It's like,
10:37if you get over,
10:38just go fucking.
10:39Yeah.
10:40You get nothing.
10:41We will let you score as many points as you want,
10:43but not that way.
10:44But what if you accidentally then let them set a record for most free throw
10:47attempts?