{"id":134207,"date":"2025-04-14T14:29:38","date_gmt":"2025-04-14T18:29:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=134207"},"modified":"2025-04-14T17:12:17","modified_gmt":"2025-04-14T21:12:17","slug":"celtics-magic-hawks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/04\/14\/celtics-magic-hawks\/","title":{"rendered":"Do the Celtics Match Up Better With the Magic or Hawks?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The NBA regular season officially wrapped up and the Boston Celtics<\/a> secured the two-seed with a 61-19 record. However, they’ll have to wait for the Play-In Tournament to find out their first-round opponent. Boston will play the winner of the Orlando Magic<\/a> and Atlanta Hawks<\/a> game which takes place on Tuesday night. The Magic finished as the regular season seven-seed with a 41-41 record while the Hawks were just behind them with a 40-42 record. While the Celtics are poised to beat either possible opponent let’s explore who would be a more favorable matchup for Boston.<\/p>\n

Do the Celtics Match Up Better With the Magic or Hawks?<\/h2>\n

How the Celtics Matchup With the Magic<\/h3>\n

At face value, the Magic’s star power led by forwards Paolo Banchero<\/a> and Franz Wagner<\/a> makes them a tougher matchup for Boston. This dynamic forward duo could be challenging considering Jaylen Brown<\/a>‘s injury<\/a>. The Magic also have an elite defense<\/a> which ranked second in the league. Orlando’s length and versatility is a notable strength. On the season, the Celtics were 1-2<\/a> against Orlando. However, one of these games came when the Celtics rested their entire top six.<\/p>\n

The Magic’s talent, star power, and defense are impressive. Regardless, stylistically Boston has a massive advantage. Firstly the Celtics lead the league in three-pointers<\/a> made while Orlando is dead last. The numbers game gives Boston a key advantage, which would be too difficult for Orlando to overcome. The Magic rank 27th in overall offense<\/a> for the season. Furthermore, the Magic rank 30th in pace<\/a> while the Celtics rank 29th. Boston thrives against fellow slow-paced teams but they struggle a bit more against fast-paced teams. Ultimately, the Magic’s combination of poor three-point shooting and slow pace bodes well for the Celtics.<\/p>\n

How the Celtics Matchup With the Hawks<\/h3>\n

Similar to the Magic, Atlanta won the season series over Boston 2-1<\/a>. However, they last played in January and the Hawks roster has changed a lot since then. The Hawks gave the Celtics trouble due to their elite wing defense, however, with Jalen Johnson<\/a> out for the season and De’Andre Hunter<\/a> now in Cleveland this strength isn’t as notable. While the Hawks still have Zaccharie Risacher<\/a> and Dyson Daniels<\/a> their wing depth isn’t the same. Elite wing defense is key to stopping the Celtics’ incredible offense led by Jayson Tatum<\/a> and Brown. Additionally, with Brown, Derrick White<\/a>, and Jrue Holiday<\/a> the Celtics can make life difficult for Trae Young<\/a>. The Hawks’ lack of scoring options outside of Young will be problematic especially compared to the Celtics’ plethora of offensive options.<\/p>\n

One advantage the Hawks have is their fast-paced style, they ranked third in pace<\/a> this season. Notably, the Celtics went just 9-6<\/a> against teams top five in pace this season. The Hawks always seem to give the Celtics a tough matchup; in the 2023 playoffs, the seven-seed Hawks gave Boston a hard-fought six-game series. While the Hawks’ style of play and experience against the Celtics will benefit them there are far too many issues to overcome.<\/p>\n

The Last Word<\/h3>\n

Ultimately, the Celtics will beat either team with relative ease, however, the Hawks pose a somewhat easier matchup. Despite the Magic’s offensive limitations, their star power gives them a better chance at making this series competitive. If the Hawks had Jalen Johnson healthy it would be a different story, as their playstyle is more successful against the Celtics than Orlando.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Photo credit: \u00a9 Eric Canha-Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The NBA regular season officially wrapped up and the Boston Celtics secured the two-seed with a 61-19 record. However, they’ll have to wait for the Play-In Tournament to find out their first-round opponent. Boston will play the winner of the Orlando Magic and Atlanta Hawks game which takes place on Tuesday night. The Magic finished […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4779,"featured_media":134294,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"1","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1608,5,62],"tags":[50041,4127,450,798,3823,1349],"class_list":["post-134207","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-basketball","category-celtics","category-nba","tag-2025-nba-playoffs","tag-franz-wagner","tag-jaylen-brown","tag-jayson-tatum","tag-paolo-banchero","tag-trae-young"],"modified_by":"Eamon Cassels, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134207","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4779"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=134207"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134207\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":134367,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134207\/revisions\/134367"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/134294"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=134207"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=134207"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=134207"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}