Pritchard Owned the Third. Boston Turned Chicago Into a 35-Point Warning.

Boston beat Chicago 134–99, and the Celtics' third quarter was where the game stopped pretending to be competitive. Payton Pritchard scored 19 of his 28 points in that period, making all five of his three-point attempts, while the Celtics outscored the Bulls 39–21. Boston had already controlled the first half. Pritchard simply turned the lead into a rout. That's a much more useful description than saying the home team 'shot the lights out' and leaving the reader to figure out how it happened.

Chicago was behind long before the avalanche

The Celtics opened 33–21 after the first twelve minutes, then went to halftime ahead 66–54. Chicago briefly mounted a response and kept the margin from becoming disastrous too early, but never actually took the lead. Jayson Tatum's 23 points included 19 in the first half, and his playmaking kept the offense from becoming a series of disconnected jump shots. The Bulls were already fighting from behind when Boston found the stretch that separated the teams for good.

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Pritchard made five threes in one quarter

That separation was the third quarter. Pritchard made five consecutive threes in the period and scored 19, turning a manageable deficit into a thirty-point problem. Boston made eight of thirteen threes in the quarter. For a defense, there's a difference between conceding a contested make and repeatedly failing to keep a shooter from reaching his preferred spot. Chicago was letting the Celtics move the ball to the same dangerous areas and then reacting after the shot was already in the air.

Pritchard finished with seven threes in ten attempts and 28 points. Tatum added seven rebounds and six assists to his 23 points, while Paul George scored 16. The Celtics made twenty-one threes in forty-four attempts, a 47.7 percent clip. They were not depending on one defender falling asleep once. They were attacking the Bulls' rotations in enough different ways that the entire shot profile became unsustainable for Chicago.

The shot-quality gap kept growing

The Bulls shot twelve-for-forty-four from three, just 27.3 percent, and made only four of their first nineteen attempts from deep. Norman Powell scored 20 and Caleb Wilson added 17, but their production wasn't enough to create a consistent outside threat. Chicago finished at 39.3 percent from the field to Boston's 49.5 percent. A team can survive one cold perimeter quarter. It is much harder to survive several quarters of poor shooting while the opponent keeps burying open threes.

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Neither team's overall turnover numbers were especially flattering, which is worth noting before pretending Boston played a flawless offensive game. The Celtics didn't have to. Their outside shooting, defensive work and ability to keep an early lead created enough separation that mistakes were not as costly. Chicago can point to its moments of improved offense in the second quarter. The lesson is that a decent stretch doesn't matter much when the next period allows the opponent to score 39 while you manage 21.

6IX TAKE — Chicago kept letting the same problem happen

6IX TAKE — I don't want to crown Boston in October, and I don't want to make this sound like a dramatic underdog story. They won by thirty-five because they were better from the opening quarter and then attacked Chicago's biggest weaknesses without mercy. Pritchard deserves the headline. Seven made threes, including five without a miss in the third, is extraordinary shooting. But the Celtics' movement and spacing are what made those attempts useful rather than hopeful. Chicago's coaching staff has to look at why the defensive rotations kept arriving late. It's easy to complain about a shooter getting hot; it's harder to acknowledge that he kept finding the exact opportunities your defense was meant to take away. The Bulls also cannot survive making twelve of forty-four from deep while allowing twenty-one on the other end. If Boston can keep pairing Tatum's creation with this kind of supporting firepower, it becomes genuinely difficult to guard. This game was convincing proof of that potential, not proof that the season is over.

What's repeatable and what's not

Boston reached 2–1 and had a cross-town Brooklyn matchup the following night. Chicago had time before meeting New York. The Celtics' assignment is repeating this precision against a defense that makes faster adjustments. The Bulls' assignment is giving their shooters better looks and their defenders clearer instructions before the same breakdown repeats.