Contrasting two years of Boston Celtics basketball at the All-Star break

The NBA’s All-Star break has come and gone, and as the dust settles on another bizarre and idiosyncratic weekend of festivities, the Boston Celtics return to the court tonight. They’ll kick off their stretch run on TNT against the Philadelphia 76ers, and as we prepare for the last two-ish months of regular season basketball, it feels like a good opportunity to look back to last season’s team at the same benchmark. How do these Celtics compare to their championship selves from last year?

Let’s get the simplest fact out of the way first: the Celtics return to play with a record of 39-16, a mark that falls short of the 43-12 they posted heading into the break last season.