Celtics notebook: Joe Mazzulla provides Kristaps Porzingis injury update

Kristaps Porzingis is making positive progress in the wake of his latest injury, according to Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla.

After Tuesday’s practice, Mazzulla shared a brief update on Porzingis, who exited Sunday’s win over the Washington Wizards with right heel pain.

“He’s getting better,” Mazzulla said. “He’s in the weight room right now. (He’ll) go through some shooting, and then we’ll just kind of see how he is day to day.”

Porzingis missed Boston’s first 17 games following offseason leg surgery, and he’s suffered two new injuries since his Nov. 25 debut: a minor ankle tweak that did not cause him to miss time and the heel injury he suffered against Washington.

The latter sent Porzingis to the locker room during the second quarter. He did not return to the game, but he called his early exit “precautionary” and said he expected to play Thursday night when the Celtics host the Chicago Bulls at TD Garden.

“I don’t think it’s anything major,” Porzingis told reporters postgame. “… I’ve had something similar in the past. I know it’s something I can play through. Just a little bit precautionary today.”

Porzingis is averaging 19.0 points, 7.0 rebounds and 1.9 blocks per game this season across seven appearances. Last week, the 7-foot-2 center said felt close to fully recovered from his offseason procedure and would need just “a couple more games” to get back to where he wanted to be physically.

It’s unclear how or if Sunday’s injury — which was to Porzingis’ other foot — will impact that timeline.

“Dangerous” layoff?

Four days off. Then two days. Then another three days.

That was the Celtics’ reward for failing to advance to the knockout rounds of the NBA Cup: a leisurely early-December schedule that featured just two games in 11 days. Rather than slugging it out against some of the league’s best teams in high-pressure, win-or-go-home battles, Boston got to face the sub-.500 Pistons and last-place Wizards and beat by double digits.

The timing of this stretch was ideal, as it followed a five-games-in-seven-nights gauntlet during which every Celtics starter missed at least one contest. But Mazzulla is wary of its potential pitfalls.

“Obviously, you get healthy, you get rest in,” Mazzulla said. “But you also get to practice the things that you want to get better at in the short term and then balance the things that you want to get better at in the long term. But it’s also dangerous. Sometimes too much time off can hurt you a little bit, so you want to make sure you take advantage of it and also make sure you’re ready to play.”

How are the Celtics avoiding those dangers?

“You just try to work on the details,” Mazzulla said. “You try to work on the things that matter. You try to make sure you have an understanding of that. It also gives you an extra day to start prepping for your opponent, which is always a good thing.”

Boston’s schedule picks back up following Thursday’s home game against Chicago. After that, the Celtics won’t have consecutive days off until Jan. 8-9 and won’t get another three-day break until All-Star Weekend in mid-February.

January also is loaded with road games against the Western Conference, which has been far more formidable than the East so far this season. The first week of 2025 features visits to Minnesota (eighth in the West), Houston (third), Oklahoma City (first) and Denver (fifth).

With that difficulty spike looming, the Celtics tried to take advantage of their current lull.

“It’s been definitely a different kind of place than when you’re every day playing a game,” center Luke Kornet said. “I think it has allowed us to take a step back of sorts. In a weird sense, being sort of removed from it. Kind of just bringing that focus back on yourselves and wherever you’re at and focus on where we’re trying to go and how we’re trying to improve.

“I do feel like this kind of period has been the best time for that assessment. You wish you were playing in these games at a really high, competitive level. I think this is a nice time to, if nothing else, continue to elevate yourself and work on things. I think we’ve been good about doing that as a team.”

Screen time

Mazzulla has praised veteran big man Al Horford for the improvement he’s shown in one of basketball’s quintessential dirty-work skills: setting screens. The head coach was asked Tuesday whether any other Celtics players deserve more credit for their work in that area.

“I wish there was a way to put screen assist on the box score because it’s just a play that’s not easily recognizable,” Mazzulla said. “But I think the team in general, especially once we acquired the likes of KP and Jrue (Holiday) and our team became well-rounded, we’ve seen so many different coverages, so many different matchups. And I think the league is changing defensively to different coverages throughout a game quickly, and so our recognition to screen versus the proper coverage is very important to our offense.

“The team takes a lot of pride in working on that, so I’d say everyone has worked on it, and it’s a responsibility for everyone to continue to get better at.”

No Celtics player ranks in the top 25 in screen assists per game (screens that directly lead to made field goals), but Neemias Queta, Horford and Kornet all sat between Nos. 26 and 45 as of Tuesday afternoon, per NBA.com. Boston as a team ranks seventh in the NBA in screen assists per game and sixth in points per game created by screen assists.

Both of those averages are way up from last season, when the Celtics ranked sixth-to-last in screen assists and 17th in points off them.

Off the rim

Some other notable Celtics “hustle” stats, per the league site: Boston’s defense leads the NBA in contested 2-point shots (26.3 per game) and contested field goals (42.5). Porzingis ranks in the top five among players in both, and in threes contested, albeit with a small sample size. At the other end of the spectrum, the Celtics rank last in the league in deflections with just 12.8 per game. Though that might be surprising considering they boast two elite defensive guards in Holiday and Derrick White, the C’s deflected even fewer balls last season (12.7) and ranked 28th.