Jordan Walsh’s impressive road trip earned him a promotion.
Celtics head coach Joe Mazzulla moved Walsh from the bench to the starting lineup for Wednesday night’s matchup with the Memphis Grizzlies at TD Garden. It was Walsh’s first start of the season and just the third of his three-year NBA career.
“He’s done a good job with just his individual defensive assignment and having an understanding of just executing the details defensively,” Mazzulla said in his pregame news conference. “He’s made some shots, but he’s also played well offensively from a spacing standpoint. I just think his energy and his effort has been top-notch. So he’s got to keep it up.”
Walsh failed to crack Mazzulla’s regular rotation in his first two seasons, and he entered Year 3 as one of the lowest players on an unsettled depth chart. The 21-year-old was a DNP-CD in four of the Celtics’ first eight games and logged less than three minutes in three others.
But over the last week, Walsh has become an everyday contributor for Boston. He played at least 18 minutes in each of Boston’s last four contests entering Wednesday, and the Celtics outscored their opponents by 51 points with him on the floor during that span.
Walsh, who’s in the final year of his rookie contract, said last Friday that he feels like he’s fighting for his basketball life. He’s played like it during his recent role expansion.
On Sunday in Orlando, Walsh hit two fourth-quarter 3-pointers in a win over the Magic, including one that iced the game with 13.2 seconds remaining. Two nights later in Philadelphia, he smothered star point guard Tyrese Maxey on three straight late-game possessions in a 102-100 loss to the 76ers.
Maxey shot 1-for-9 while being guarded by Walsh in the game, per NBA player tracking. He and Magic stars Paolo Banchero and Franz Wagner combined to go 4-for-16 (0-for-5 from three) with two blocked shots and three turnovers across 68 partial possessions against Walsh.
Walsh also came into Wednesday’s game with seven steals and three blocks over his last four appearances.
“At the end of the day, he’s giving us great effort, great energy,” Mazzulla said. “He just has an understanding of our defense, and he’s playing well. I think just his professionalism has been great. His work ethic’s there. He’s gotten more opportunity this year, obviously, and I think he’s taken advantage of it.”
Mazzulla gave Walsh the starting nod over Josh Minott, who had started the previous nine games. Minott was a minus-10 in eight minutes against Philadelphia and did not see the floor after halftime.
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