The Celtics pulled off the biggest comeback of the season in their 103-95 victory over the Indiana Pacers Monday night at TD Garden.
In the team's last home game of the 2025 calendar year, they gave their fans a great gift for the holiday season in the form a 20-point rally via the C's bench when coach Joe Mazzulla decided to pull his starters just minutes into the third quarter.
Anfernee Simons, Sam Hauser, Baylor Scheierman, and Luka Garza, alongside rookie Hugo Gonzalez checked in and sliced the deficit to 10, before Jaylen Brown scored 18 of his 31 points in the final 13 minutes to secure the win.
Gonzalez played nearly the entire second half, recording a new career-best 11 rebounds, to go along with six points, two block and a steal in a season-high 37 minutes of action. While Scheierman had the tough assignment of having to slow down Andrew Nembhard, it was Gonzalez that was crashing the boards and was a huge part of holding the Pacers to just 13 points in the fourth quarter.
Coming off the heal of his first double-double (10 points, 10 rebounds) in the Celtics 112-96 comeback victory over the Raptor this past weekend -- Gonzalez has clearly earned the trust of Mazzulla to sub in and make an impact once again in the midst of another double-digit deficit.
"He comes in and just plays hard," Scheierman said of his teammate Gonzalez. "He brings a lot of energy."
Meanwhile, Gonzalez, who is shooting 41.9% from 3-point range in 14.2 minutes per contest so far this season, gave props to Scheierman as well following his 12 minutes of great play on the defensive end to spark the comeback in the third quarter.
"He's just been incredible -- today's game was a lot on his shoulders," Gonzalez said. "He was able to not play in the first half, but [did] in the second half, it's not the first time he does it. He was part of that run in the third quarter to come back."
The Celtics at 18-11, look to win their fourth-straight when they face the Pacers once again on the back-end of a home-and-home the day after Christmas.
Joel Pavón
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