Jrue Holiday’s still got it

A few factors came into play when the Orlando Magic offense came crashing back down to its league-worst normalcy.

Their 3-point shooting regressed back to its usual standards, having gone 7/18 from distance in the first half and just 3/9 from the perimeter in the second, and their paint scoring was hindered by Boston’s swarming help defense at the rim, but the factor most important to this particular blog has to do with the defensive performance of Jrue Holiday.

Kung Fu Jrue, as he’s apparently known according to Basketball Reference, played about as solid a defensive game as you’re going to find. Orlando players shot just 2/10 when guarded by Holiday, with that 20% defensive efficiency being the lowest among any Celtics starter in Game 1.

More importantly, he defended Orlando’s dynamic wing duo at an impressive rate. According to Basketball Index, Paolo Banchero was defended by guards just 19.88% of the time during the regular season (28th percentile among all players). Unfortunately for him, Holiday is not your average guard.

Jrue was the leader of the pack on the Banchero assignment, defending him for a team-high 5 minutes and 15 seconds (38% of his minutes defensively for the game). In that time, Banchero was flummoxed, stymied, swarmed and just downright miserable in those possessions, shooting 0-for-4 with one turnover when defended by the All-Defensive Team mainstay.

On two of those shot attempts, Holiday’s strength holds up against the physically imposing Banchero, who resorts to a baseline fadeaway that you’ll live with every single time he has the ball. On the other two, Banchero was more aggressive, working his way into the paint like a player his size should when defended by a guard.

Luckily, Holiday had help.

On both attempts, Kristaps Porzingis completely abandoned the Wendell Carter matchup to deliver a helping hand. Unless Banchero the playmaker emerges and punishes the attention drawn his way, the Celtics can sell out on those drives, forcing Banchero into tougher looks at the rim.

Franz Wagner fared only slightly better, shooting 1-for-3 with two turnovers when defended by Jrue (1:45 spent on that matchup). Much like Banchero, Wagner does not see a lot of time dealing with guard mismatches, facing off against them 28.32% of the time over the course of the season (42nd percentile). Wagner was mostly defended by Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown throughout this contest, but in the moments where Holiday needed to step up and handle the assignment, he delivered.

I do not believe Orlando was prepared to see Holiday take that active of a role on their primary scorer. There was just one game this regular season that Holiday matched up on Banchero, and the Duke product shot 3/6 from the field, had zero turnovers and earned one trip to the line in that 2:46 sample. NBA’s tracking data shows that there was no instance of Wagner and Holiday matching up this season.

The final shot of this clip package should look familiar. With Holiday defending him, Banchero settles for that same off-balance baseline jumper we saw yesterday.

Therein lies the beauty of a Game 1. Regular season data, trends and matchup histories can tell us a story or provide a hint at the tactical directions a coach can follow, but it can also throw us off the scent. There are adjustments and counter-moves to follow that’ll show us if Holiday continues to hone in on these wing matchups, but the fact of the matter is after one game, we know what he can do on these matchups, both on an island and with some help. We’ve seen Jrue’s defensive aptitude directly influence a Banner 18 run, now we’re off on a quest for No. 19, and that defense remains as sharp as ever.