The Boston Celtics came into their Eastern Conference semifinals series versus the New York Knicks as heavy favorites. And it made sense — Boston is the defending champ and dominated the regular season series versus New York with a 4-0 record.

The Knicks struggled beating good teams all season and were just an OK road team.

But the Knicks shocked the basketball world this week by winning both of the first two games in Boston, including a 91-90 victory Wednesday night in Game 2. Now they have a chance to take a commanding 3-0 lead Saturday afternoon when the series shifts to Madison Square Garden.

How can the Celtics get back in the series after two crushing losses in which they blew leads of 20-plus points?

Here are four areas of emphasis:

Don’t worry about Mitchell Robinson

There are times when “Hack-a-Robinson” is a good strategy. Robinson is an atrocious free throw shooter. He’s 4-for-11 in the series and shooting 26.7 percent from the free throw line in the playoffs.

But it doesn’t make any sense to put your team on the verge of being in the penalty just to put him on the line or get him off the floor. That’s what the Celtics did late in the fourth quarter of Game 2. The C’s had two fouls to give with 2:41 left in the game and they committed two take fouls on Robinson. The second one was the Celtics’ fourth team foul, which meant the next foul would put the Knicks at the free throw line.

Knicks head coach Tom Thibodeau was going to sub out Robinson after the first take foul, but kept him in to see if the C’s would foul him again, which they did. Then he took out Robinson.

Here is Celtics head coach Joe Mazzulla’s explanation for fouling Robinson twice wth under three minutes to play:

When Robinson exited, OG Anunoby came in. Anunoby is an elite defensive player and capable of hitting 3-pointers. The Celtics should want Robinson on the floor over Anunoby at all times.

Robinson is a very good defensive player. He’s a strong rebounder and the best shot blocker on the Knicks. He makes an impact, there’s no doubt about that. But he’s mostly a non-factor offensively, which allows the Celtics to double and put more pressure on other Knicks players on defense.

Robinson also is someone the Celtics can hunt on the perimeter by getting him matched up on Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown on pick-and-rolls. Tatum and Brown are both quicker than Robinson and can drive to the basket against him.

Hack-a-Robinson works in the right situations. But not late in the game when it puts you close to the penalty. The Celtics need to worry about their own offensive issues and less about whether Robinson is on the floor.

Switch OG Anunoby off of Jayson Tatum

Jayson Tatum played like a superstar in the first round against the Magic. He scored an average of 31.3 points with 11.3 rebounds and 5.3 assists per game. He’s played nowhere near that level in the second round.

Tatum is averaging 18 points on 12-for-42 shooting (5-for-20 on 3-pointers). In Game 2, Tatum scored just 13 points on 5-for-19 shooting.

After an awful 3-point shooting display in Game 1, Tatum attempted more of his shots from two-point range in Game 2. But even then, he settled for too many contested mid-range field goals (see shot chart below). He didn’t get to the basket enough, evidenced by his two free throw attempts.

One reason for Tatum’s lackluster scoring in this series is OG Anunoby. The Knicks forward held Tatum to 4-for-16 shooting in the regular season, and he’s continued that success in this series. Tatum is shooting 1-for-7 versus Anunoby through two games.

Anunoby spent 8:26 as the primary defender on Tatum in Game 2 and Boston’s superstar attempted only one shot. Anunoby was all over Tatum on the final play of the game, forcing a turnover that sealed the Celtics’ loss.

Mikal Bridges guarded Tatum a bunch during the four regular season matchups and Tatum scored 35 points on 13-for-19 shooting versus the Knicks wing. The Knicks made an adjustment going into Round 2 to make Anunoby the primary defender on Tatum, and it’s working great for them.

The Celtics must do everything they can, whether it’s the pick-and-roll or something else, to get Anunoby away from Tatum as often as possible. They’ve done it a few times in the series, which resulted in Tatum getting Jalen Brunson or Mitchell Robinson in a switch.

That’s the kind of matchup hunting the Celtics must do in Game 3.

Lean on road success

The Celtics were a historically great road team this season, setting a franchise record with 33 victories. In fact, their 33-8 road record was tied for the second-best in league history.

Boston ranked No. 2 in offensive rating, defensive rating and net rating away from home during the regular season.

They also went 2-0 against the Knicks at Madison Square Garden — a 27-point win on Feb. 8 and a two-point win in overtime on April 8. The Celtics haven’t lost at MSG since the 2022-23 campaign.

Meanwhile, the Knicks are 1-2 at home in the playoffs.

The Celtics are a great road team, and that should give them plenty of confidence entering Game 3 despite the rough start to the series.

Knock down 3-point shots

Seems obvious, right? It’s a make or miss league, and unfortunately for the Celtics, they’ve missed a ton of open shots in this series that they normally make.

The Celtics were actually the most prolific 3-point shooting team in league history during the regular season, setting records for most 3-pointers made and attempted.

They made only 10 3-pointers on 40 attempts in Game 2. It was a huge outlier for them, because during the regular season, the C’s made 10 or fewer 3-point shots in just three of their 82 games.

Through two games against the Knicks, the Celtics are shooting 25 percent (25-for-100) from beyond the arc. That’s 11.8 percent worse than their regular season average, which is a huge dropoff. The Celtics are shooting at least 10 percent worse in the playoffs compared to the regular season on pretty much every type of 3-pointer imaginable.

Despite missing a record amount of 3-pointers, the Celtics still only lost Game 1 by three points and Game 2 by one point. If they missed 72 3-pointers instead of 75, they could easily be up 2-0 in the series.

The Celtics are a much better outside shooting team than they’ve shown against the Knicks. It’s hard to imagine these 3-point shooting woes extending much longer. There were only four instances in the regular season in which Boston made 15 or fewer 3-pointers in consecutive games.

The turnaround needs to happen ASAP, though. No team in league history has overcome an 0-3 series deficit.