BOSTON — Both Neemias Queta and Luka Garza are dealing with a non-COVID illness and are questionable to play in the Celtics’ Monday night game against the Portland Trail Blazers. Queta has been dealing with the illness since Friday, while Garza was a late addition on Monday morning.
If both centers are out, two-way rookie Amari Williams could once again see an extended on-court opportunity. Williams, who has mostly spent the year in the G League, played 5 minutes in Friday’s double overtime win over the Brooklyn
Nets, and started for the first time in his NBA career in Saturday’s clutch-time loss to the Chicago Bulls, tallying 10 minutes.
“Sometimes it hits me that I’m playing in the NBA — especially playing at a center like this,” Williams said after the win over the Nets. “I’ve never been to the Barclays Center before, but once you go out there and you start realizing who you’re going against and what you’ve been asked to do, it just kind of goes away.”
The 23-year-old has appeared in 10 NBA games this season, his longest stint coming in a November win over the Detroit Pistons.
Williams was supposed to appear in a Maine Celtics game on Friday, but after Queta popped up on the injury report with illness, the rookie took a last-second flight to New York City to meet the team. He came up huge in the second overtime, finishing an and-one layup and getting a big block down the stretch.
“It’s just a credit to the continuity — the continuity of what Phil’s doing in Maine, what the Maine staff is doing, what our PD [player development] team is doing, and what the assistants are doing before the game,” Mazzulla said. “So that you don’t really miss a beat because of the continuity of where guys are at — so you have a trust that he’ll always be prepared.”
In the G League, Williams has averaged 17.3 points, 11.8 rebounds, and 4.4 assists.
In addition to Garza and Queta, Josh Minott is questionable with an ankle sprain that’s held him out of action since January 3rd. This is the first game he hasn’t been outright listed as out for.
The Celtics face the Blazers at 8pm on Monday night at TD Garden.
