The Boston Celtics have raised eyebrows this season with a dramatic increase in one particular type of play.
Anecdotally, at least.
The coaching staff has acknowledged it. The analytics staff has acknowledged it. The media has commented on it.
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the era of the tip rebound.
There is no questioning the fact that Boston’s players have increased their frequency of purposefully tipping rebounds to their teammates at both ends of the court this season. Since the start of the campaign, some form of nonverbal communication has seemingly led to a Celtics franchise record of tip rebounds. This development has oftentimes led to either second-chance scoring opportunities on offense, or transition possessions out of the defensive end.
Tip Rebounds
To be clear, this is totally anecdotal information at this point that is substantiated only by the eye test, as tip rebounds are not tracked by any public website, nor by Boston’s internal analytics team. But within the walls of the locker room, there is an acknowledgment that there has been an uptick in this department this season.
“Yeah, I think so,” Sam Hauser acknowledged of an increase in controlled tips this season for Boston. “I think we’ve put more of an emphasis on getting to the offensive glass, just trying to get extra possessions.”
Hauser’s take is in perfect harmony with that of Boston’s coaching staff.
Celtics assistant coach DJ MacLeay, who spends much of his time working with Boston’s big men, said that the team has never directly coached the play or instructed players to tip rebounds to teammates. Instead, he says, the increase in tip rebounds this season is a result of a shift in overall approach to team rebounding.
“I think it’s a natural byproduct of crashing and offensive rebounding,” MacLeay said to Celtics Insiders of the increase in tip rebounds. “I think it’s something that we do talk about through the lens of offensive rebounding. It’s through the lens of getting closer to the rim and making it a point of crashing the basket after the shot goes up and crashing the paint, just to give ourselves an opportunity at a second chance so that we’re putting ourselves in a good position to win the margins and maintain the shot margin with other teams.”
Shot margin has been a talking point for Joe Mazzulla all season long. He has constantly told both the team and the media how important it is to win that category. The reasoning behind this approach is tied to simple math: if you take more shots than the opponent, you have a greater opportunity to score more points than the opponent.
Boston’s analytics team diagnosed rebounding as a growth opportunity with relation to shot margin and relayed that to the coaching staff this past offseason. Mazzulla and his staff took that information and ran with it. However, it’s up to the players to both embrace that analytical data and act on it during game action. And they have.
It has also appeared to the naked eye that team chemistry has played a role in Boston’s increase of tip rebounds. It’s one thing to tip a rebound to a teammate who isn’t expecting it. It’s another thing to tip a rebound to a teammate after you’ve locked eyes and you both know what’s about to happen.
The latter is what has occurred time and time again this season for this group of Celtics, who MacLeay calls “the most connected group I’ve ever been a part of in the NBA.” The heightened connectivity has generated an unparalleled amount of nonverbal communication on the court, with tip rebounds being just one example.
As MacLeay made sure to mention, though, this entire conversation is predicated upon that initial emphasis of throwing as many bodies at the glass as possible. That emphasis is the genesis of all things tip rebounds.
“I think in general, being engaged in the rebounding creates a connectivity,” MacLeay said. “You can’t have a great tip rebound without having more bodies in there. So I think the concerted effort we made as a staff and as a team was to teach and coach to the proximity, getting into the paint, being more aware and having a greater understanding of that rebounding, then you create those connections because you’re there.”
Next time you watch the Celtics, take note of how often the Celtics are there, crashing the glass as a unit. Then you’ll be able to wrap your head around what’s creating all of these tip rebound opportunities.