BOSTON – A test of depth will take place at TD Garden on Wednesday night when the Warriors and Boston Celtics face off in what looks to be a matchup between two of the NBA’s best teams to date.

Warriors coach Steve Kerr’s 12-man staff has risen to the challenge, although Golden State will still be without guard De’Anthony Melton, who will miss his fifth straight game with a lower back strain. Melton participated in 3-on-3 drills during the Warriors’ shootout and appeared to experience no discomfort throughout the session, as well as during the full-court sprints.

The Celtics will be without reigning NBA Finals MVP Jaylen Brown, who missed his third straight game with a left hip flexor strain, and Kristaps Porzingis, who continues to recover from offseason surgery on his left leg .

While the Warriors will once again rely on having the best-scoring bench in the NBA and the Celtics will need reserves to keep rising, it’s clear that the difference in this highly anticipated matchup will be in the 3-point range -line can lie.

“Make them tough opponents,” Draymond Green said at the Warriors’ shootaround Wednesday morning. “You don’t want to miss out on the swing-swing threes where guys are wide open. Let them make hard threes and live with the result.”

Just like last season, the Celtics were by far the team with the highest number of long-distance shots in the league. Last season, they averaged 42.5 3-point attempts and 16.5 makes, both of which led the NBA. And both numbers saw extreme increases in eight games, once again surpassing all of basketball. The Celtics are averaging 19 three-pointers per game on 50.9 attempts.

Conversely, the Warriors rank second with 16.4 attempts per game and fourth with an average of 42 attempts.

But as their defense has improved exponentially, no one has been better at protecting the arc than the Warriors. In the first seven games against the Warriors, opponents only made 10.3 three-pointers and a shooting rate of 28.3 percent, which is the lowest in the league. Green believes this is a byproduct of everyone engaging defensively from the start and understanding how teams work.

“Guys are committed to that side of the ball,” Green said. “If you want to defend well in this league, you have to guard the 3-point line. … I think we’re doing a good job of making this a priority. If you want to be a top-10 and top-5 defenseman – if you can’t guard the three, that’s not going to happen. So that has to be a focus.”

Golden State defensive specialist Gary Payton II says he actually prefers playing against a team that wants to launch threes at a historic pace. For him, the strategy meets the Warriors’ goal of being a strong transition team on both sides and achieving a 3-point lead.

“It makes my job easier,” he said. “I don’t have to worry about anyone getting to the cup. Sit back and hope they hit deep threes and long rebounds. Try to make it difficult for them. But we know the league and know that everyone now likes to play with three players.

“We rely on it and try our best to make it difficult, but it is what it is.”

Payton made a surprising start in the Warriors’ 125-112 win over the Washington Wizards, marking his first appearance in the opening lineup since February 8, 2023, his last game as part of the Portland Trail Blazers. The move was to stop former Warrior Jordan Poole from coming through the gates hot, and it worked.

Although Poole scored a team-high 24 points, he did so on 8-of-20 shooting and was just 2-of-10 from three. In the first quarter, in which the Warriors held the Wizards to just 20 points, Poole went 3 of 8 from the field and made one of his five 3-point attempts.

It’s unknown if Payton will be back in the starting lineup on Wednesday night, but in any case, Payton Pritchard is a player he’ll be sure to protect. The veteran scored 18 points off the bench in the Celtics’ loss to the Hawks on Monday night and is shooting 43.2 percent on 9.3 3-point attempts per game.

“We know Payton shoots 10 three-pointers. Once he comes in, we have to find him and know where these guys are to make it difficult for them,” Payton said.

In their first game since defeating the Dallas Mavericks in last season’s NBA Finals, the Celtics came out and made an NBA record 29 3-pointers on opening night. The most three-pointers the Warriors have allowed in a game is 15, and that was in their overtime win against the Houston Rockets four days ago.

Whichever team makes more triples at TD Garden will likely make the difference. Better yet, this matchup could well come down to who is better at defending the three-ball – an area the Warriors will be proud of and looking to prove is a strength even against the best.

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