Jaylen Brown of the Celtics celebrates after scoring a basket against the Orlando Magic during Friday’s game in Boston. Michael Dwyer/Associated Press
BOSTON — Jayson Tatum scored 30 points, Payton Pritchard added 21 off the bench, and the Celtics remained unbeaten in Boston this season with a 128-111 victory over the Orlando Magic on Friday night.
The victory was the Celtics’ 13th straight in Boston – the second-longest streak to start a season in franchise history. Bill Russell, Bob Cousy and Tommy Heinsohn led Boston to 17 home wins in a row to open the 1957-58 season.
The Celtics have not lost at home in 20 regular-season games dating to March 5 of last season. They did lose in last season’s playoffs, including a Game 7 to the Miami Heat in the Eastern Conference finals.
Jaylen Brown scored 18 points for Boston, Derrick White added 19 points and eight assists, and Pritchard went 6 of 7 from 3-point range.
Jalen Suggs scored 19 points, and Goga Bitadze had 15 points and 11 rebounds for the Magic, who had beaten the Celtics four times in a row. One of them was an In-Season Tournament game in Orlando – Boston’s only loss in the group stage.
The Celtics missed their first eight 3-point attempts before Pritchard sank one with five minutes left in the first quarter to cut a six-point deficit in half. He added another 30 seconds later and one more as the final basket of the quarter during an 18-7 closing run that gave Boston a 30-24 lead.
Orlando came within one point early in the second on back-to-back 3s by Cole Anthony before Boston scored 16 of the next 21 points to pull away. The Celtics led by as many as 16 points in the second quarter and 25 points in the third.
Boston was without four players – Al Horford, Luke Kornet, Kristaps Porzingis and Dalano Banton.
Horford rested on the tail end of back-to-back games, so his absence was no surprise. Porzingis is still dealing with a calf injury that caused him to miss time earlier this month. Coach Joe Mazzulla does not expect his absence to extend over the long term, however.
“I just think we’re being cautious,” Mazzulla said of the calf injury. “But he’s done a good job of taking care of it and he’s come up well after we played. So just being cautious with it.”
Kornet is expected to miss about a week because of an adductor strain, according to Mazzulla, while Banton was a late add to the injury report, being ruled out due to a non-COVID illness.
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