While the Celtics’ Payton Pritchard is done dropping buckets at Summer League, he was busy dropping loftier numbers in the Portland Pro-Am Summer League. In a high-scoring game, Pritchard put up a whopping 92 points to lift his team to a 165-163 win.
Pritchard’s team needed all of those points in a two-point win, just days after exiting Summer League play. Pritchard’s last game with the C’s in Las Vegas was on Thursday. He wasn’t present in practice Friday as Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla said Pritchard left after a team-excused absence because of a “prior engagement.”
While Pritchard might have other events in the coming days, he was still making some noise on social media after such an impressive scoring outburst. Pritchard’s team faced Mike James, who most recently played for the Nets, as the guard put up 63 points. (Check out the fourth quarter highlights for the game here.)
It doesn’t hurt Pritchard starred in his hometown Portland, where Boston first-year coach Ime Udoka also grew up. Udoka filled his staff with former Portland legends, including coaches Damon Stoudamire, Aaron Miles and Ben Sullivan.
The high-scoring number looks great — 92 points in a single game is something else — and that should only add to the excitement surrounding Pritchard. He had a stellar Summer League performance through three games, clearly looking like one of the best guards in Las Vegas as he enters his second year in the pros.
Pritchard finished Summer League averaging 20.3 points and 8.7 assists per game on 57.7% 3-point shooting.
