Carsen Edwards has just begun to pour salt on his flamethrower performance on Tuesday night against the Cleveland Cavaliers, pacing the Boston Celtics with 30 points in an incandescent shooting display at Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse.
The 6-foot rookie canned 8-of-11 from deep in a span of six minutes of the third quarter, shocking teammates and coaches with his shooting display:
But should one scorching night equate to a rotation spot for the young rookie?
Head coach Brad Stevens already seems to be impressed, which is only positive for a player hoping to carve out some rotation minutes:
“I don't know if I've ever seen anything like that,” said Stevens after the game, according to Chris Forsberg of NBC Sports Boston. “Those were deep, hard 3s. And how many? Eight? In like five minutes? I've never seen anything like that… He was pretty special.”
As seen in the video above, this wasn't merely some catch-and-shoot goodness, but also a few pull-up bombs that prove he's able to punch a defense in the mouth on or off the ball:
The Celtics have a number of guards on their roster and will have to make some decisions with Tremont Waters and Brad Wanamaker, as Marcus Smart is primed to again play a key role after the departures of Kyrie Irving and Terry Rozier.
Jayson Tatum moving to the power forward position opens up room for Gordon Hayward at small forward and Jaylen Brown at shooting guard, making the sixth man in Smart and fellow rookie Romeo Langford the immediate competition for Edwards to worry about in the backcourt.
Boston will need shooting, with Smart and Brown proving to be only mediocre 3-point shooters. To have a weapon who can stretch the floor and attack the way Edwards has done throughout the preseason will be invaluable for a team that has made its mark with quality bench scoring through Stevens' regime as coach.
It's uncertain how many minutes he could play with so many bodies lobbying for playing time, but a healthy 20 minutes per game could certainly put the rookie in a good position to contribute at both guard positions, so long as he can keep up his offensive punch when the 82-game regular season begins.