Breaking down the Celtics' improbable road trip

Zeller (14 pts) and Prince (19 pts) were the C's top two scorers in Utah, as unlikely an occurrence as Boston's three recent victories.

Here's the one stat I think best sums up the Celtics' unexpectedly successful venture out west:


And from Marc D'Amico of Celtics.com:

[Boston] just played its fourth game in five nights after traveling a total of 2,552 miles since Game 1 of the stretch came to an end.

Two of those four games just so happened to be played in the two highest-altitude cities in the league, and the other two were played against two of the NBA’s top three teams.

The Celtics also lost two key players during the stretch, Marcus Smart for one game and and Kelly Olynyk for the foreseeable future.

ESPN Boston's Chris Forsberg notes it's the most travel any team will do all season in a five-day span.  Yet somehow the Celtics won three of those four games.  Their only loss was by three points to the best team in the NBA, who also happens to be 21-1 at home.

Next up is the league-worst Minnesota Timberwolves (7-37) on Wednesday.  The Celtics have a very good chance to finish 4-2 on this six-game jaunt through the West, after not winning in any of the conference's 15 cities in their previous 24 tries.

There's also this: At 16-27 Boston is just two games back of the East's final playoff spot.

Who saw this coming?



Follow Mark Vandeusen on Twitter @LucidSportsFan

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