The Boston Celtics snapped the Detroit Pistons’ 13-game winning streak in their last game.
Now, the Celtics are looking to build a winning streak of their own.
Boston will return to the court for the first time since Thanksgiving when it takes on the Minnesota Timberwolves on Saturday evening in Minneapolis. It marks the start of a two-game road trip for the Celtics, who also will visit the Cleveland Cavaliers before returning home.
Celtics forward Jaylen Brown is feeling good as he and his teammates hunt for their third straight victory. He pointed to a 117-114 win over the Pistons as the latest reason for optimism.
“It’s awesome,” Brown said. “We’ve just got to find a way to maintain it. I love what I’ve seen from our guys. Our guys are developing and getting better, and that’s what we’ve got to be. We’ve got to be the harder-playing team, we’ve got to be physical, all of that stuff.
“If we get that more times than not, we’ll be just fine.”
Meanwhile, the Timberwolves return home after an 0-3 road trip that included visits to Phoenix, Sacramento and Oklahoma City. Before the road trip, Minnesota had won six of its previous seven games.
Timberwolves coach Chris Finch said he saw promising glimpses in the latest game against the league-leading Thunder. Minnesota lost the game 113-105 but battled in the single-digit loss.
“We’re playing with a little more physicality,” Finch said. “Better at the rim. Point-of-attack defense has been better. We’ve generally not been fouling as much.”
One area the Timberwolves will try to improve on Saturday is at the free-throw line. The Timberwolves made only 22 of 37 free-throw attempts (59.5%) in their last game.
Timberwolves forward Julius Randle, who made four of seven shots from the charity stripe, said that problem should be easily corrected.
“We’ve got to clean that up,” Randle said. “We’ve got good free-throw shooters on this team.”
Anthony Edwards leads the Timberwolves with 28.0 points per game on 47.5% shooting. Randle (23.4 points per game) and Jaden McDaniels (16.1) round out the top three scorers.
Brown leads the Celtics with 28.2 points per game on 49.5% shooting. Payton Pritchard has averaged 16.6 points per game, and Derrick White is third on the team with 16.0 points per game.
White will try to stay hot after dropping 27 points on 7-for-13 shooting against the Pistons on Wednesday. White added seven rebounds, three assists, three steals and one blocked shot.
“That’s the D-White that we know and love,” Brown said. “When D-White is aggressive, that’s a great sign for our team. He came out, he absolutely balled (against Detroit). We’ve got to find ways to get him more active, more involved, but Derrick was a star. I love to see it.”
Timberwolves second-year guard Terrence Shannon Jr. will appear in his third game since returning from a foot injury. Shannon made all seven of his shots and finished with a season-high 18 points against Oklahoma City.
“It was good to see him return to form,” Finch said. “That’s the TJ that we saw last year and we saw all throughout the preseason.”
