Jakob Pöltl suffered a narrow defeat in his 500th appearance in the National Basketball Association (NBA) regular season on Friday (local time).
The Toronto Raptors lost to the Boston Celtics 105-108. The celebratory player from Vienna had eleven points, eight rebounds, four assists and one steal. The center was on the floor for 33:50 minutes.
The Raptors once again showed comeback qualities, as they were already down 49:65 at halftime.
It was up to Pöltl to give his team the lead for the last time with 1:19 minutes left, 103:101. Derrick White, a former teammate of the 28-year-old Viennese, prevented a possible victory in the game, which was extremely exciting until the end thanks to the Canadians’ strong second half of the game. Pöltl’s former teammate at the San Antonio Spurs scored with 28 seconds left in the game to make it 106:103 for the Celtics.
Pöltl has over 4,000 career points
Pöltl said after the game that he “wasn’t on his radar” about his anniversary and therefore “didn’t think about it.” Of course it would have been nice to win, added the local NBA pioneer. He has 263 wins in the regular season so far. In addition, the center now has 4,059 points, 3,275 rebounds and 620 blocks in the strongest basketball league in the world.
Boston, now the sole NBA leader, celebrated its fifth win in a row and its tenth in its twelfth game of the season. Toronto has a 5-7 record. The best scorers were Pascal Siakam and Dennis Schröder with 23 points each for the Canadians. The Celtics were led by Jaylen Brown with 23 points as well.
New “in-season tournament” should provide more excitement
The game against Boston was also Toronto’s first in the new tournament format. The “in-season tournament” for the NBA Cup trophy is intended to increase the excitement during the regular season. The winner will be announced on December 9th in Las Vegas.
The Raptors will face the Detroit Pistons in their fourth home game in a row on Sunday. The laggard in the NBA East suffered its eleventh defeat in the 13th game of the season on Friday with a 100:108 at the Cleveland Cavaliers.
The Philadelphia 76ers stayed on the heels of the Celtics with a 126:116 defeat at the Atlanta Hawks. Joel Embiid scored 32 points for the winners. Defending champion Denver Nuggets suffered their third defeat in the twelfth game of the season with 110:115 at the New Orleans Pelicans. Nikola Jokic’s 110th career triple-double didn’t change that. The center recorded 26 points, 18 assists and 16 rebounds. Zion Williamson also scored 26 points for the Pelicans.
2023-11-18 13:31:37
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