BOSTON — Mikal Bridges has to be better defensively.
The star Knicks forward admitted as much after drawing the primary defensive assignment on Celtics All-Star Jayson Tatum, who torched the Knicks for 32 points in the C’s 132-109 season-opening victory on Tuesday night.
“Nah, I definitely could have done better. I think my performance at the defensive end wasn’t that well for me personally, as well as our team,” Bridges said after the loss. “But me personally, I think I just could have been better, especially a guy getting it and having that rhythm from the three, just getting up a little bit more. He had a nice move on me in the paint as well. Just gotta be better. I mean, game one, just gotta learn from it, and just get better from it.”
Tatum shot 14-of-18 from the field and 8-of-11 from three-point range in Tuesday’s blowout against the Knicks. His night marked the fifth-most efficient three-point shooting performance in Celtics history among players to attempt at least 10 threes in a game.
Tatum also dished 10 assists and grabbed four rebounds on the night. Knicks head coach Tom Thibodeau opted to give OG Anunoby the Jaylen Brown assignment, and Tatum took advantage.
“Tatum is going to be a problem. He’s a great player,” Thibodeau said after the game. “You got to try to guard him with your team, you can’t guard him individually. There were compilation of things. We gave him some different looks, but we got to be a lot better.”
While Bridges had his fair share of struggles on defense, his offense took a turn for the better on Tuesday.
The Knicks’ third scoring option missed his first five shots but finished the game making seven of his final eight attempts, totaling 16 points on the night.
It was a welcome sight for a player who couldn’t find the bottom of the rim during the preseason, where he shot just 2-of-19 from three-point range over four exhibition games.
“Man, my teammates keep finding me. Just making one [helped me catch a rhythm]. I think that’s pretty much it,” Bridges said. “Just making one is just like letting the lid off. But that’s pretty much it just teammates finding me, staying aggressive and that’s pretty much it.”
A quote from Bridges, who said he’s been attempting to fix his jump shot ever since leaving Villanova for the NBA, went viral on social media after he shot 0-of-10 from downtown in the preseason finale loss to the Washington Wizards.
Josh Hart stuck up for his teammate after Tuesday’s loss.
“Yeah, Mikal don’t care about anything else. We don’t care about all that background noise about Mikal, his shot, all that other — we don’t care about it,” said Hart. “He puts the work in every day. He’s going to be good. The talk around it is stupid and there is stupidity to it because at the end of the day, he’s been almost a 40% three-point shooter. Talk around it is stupid, and we’re not really going to entertain it.”