This is what a superstar is supposed to do.
I can sit here and show you charts and graphs and stats and videos about what a team needs to do. I can go on and on about ball movement-this or team basketball-that. But sometimes basketball is just about a guy who can find a way -- any way -- to get a bucket.
When Giannis Antetokounmpo hit a 3-pointer to cut the Boston to lead to four, there was a distinct ‘here we go again’ feel to the game, but Jayson Tatum wouldn’t let his team fade. He answered with a shot clock-beating fadeaway. He answered Pat Connaughton’s tough driving layup with a late-clock 3. When Connaughton did it again later, Tatum answered from the same spot, in Connaughton’s face, hopping and nodding his way up the right sideline in celebration.
“He was unbelievable. He was knocking down shots, tough shots, getting to his spots. You gotta give him credit,” Antetokounmpo said after the Game 6 loss. “I think as a team we did a good job of being in front of him, making him shoot contested 3s, contested 2s, but he made them. You gotta respect that. He played unbelievable.”
It was clear from the beginning of the game that a classic might have been on tap. Tatum was a big part of the early 3-point barrage that kept Boston in things while Antetokounmpo was rampaging his way to a 44-point, 20-rebound night. Tatum was consistently good throughout the game, scoring 9, 9, and 12 points in the first, second, and third quarters. In the fourth, he upped it to 16, out-dueling Antetokounmpo’s 12.
“It's why he gets paid the big bucks. That's it right there, for moments like that,” Marcus Smart said. “We did our jobs in the first half to give him a break while they were doing a good job on him. We stood up and stepped up and took care for him and then he came in and do what he did, who he is, and took that game over in the fourth and brought us all home.”
It’s another feather in Tatum’s cap, one which gets the national media drooling about rivalries between these two teams for years to come. The Tatum-Antetokounmpo duels could be a fixture, with the legends of nights like this echoing through history as a golden age for the Eastern Conference. It wouldn’t be surprising if the next half-decade is full of “Celtics-Bucks winner goes to the Finals”-type series.
“You got two juggernauts going at it,” Smart said. “You got two defensive-minded teams that are physical and we're beating each other up. So that's why and not taking nothing away from anybody else in their series, but you see it, they got three 7-footers over there, we got a couple 7-footers, we got a couple 6-9 guys. So it's hard, especially being in the playoffs, this is what it's about.”
Tatum needed to come through in Game 6, because it can easily be argued that his Game 3 stinker and his missed shots in Game 5 were part of why this game was even necessary. But stars have bad games sometimes. What the best of the best do is make up for it.
That's what got Tatum going in this one.
“Knowing that if we lost our season would be over with. I was excited to play today,” he said. “This was like a big moment, for all of us. For myself and the team just how we would respond. Losing Game 5 was going to make us or break us. I think we showed a lot of toughness and growth coming out here and getting a win on the road and just giving ourselves a chance.”
Tatum gave Boston life with what Jaylen Brown called a “signature performance.” It’s the type of game that will go onto his Hall of Fame highlight reel. His drive down the lane could have been a highlight dunk on half the Bucks, but Connaughton’s foul actually turned it into a better moment.
His foul sent the ball bouncing off the rim and backboard for an and-1, and it let Tatum taunt the home crowd with a shoulder roll and flex that let everyone know he was too strong for them on this night.
“I knew I had it going on the offensive end,” Tatum said. “It just boils down to -- it was five, six minutes left and this was our season on the line, and knowing that leave it all on the floor. And that's the mindset that I have, the mindset that we all have. So wasn't gonna leave anything out there and have any regrets. So just trying to do what it took.”
The Celtics needed him to do just about everything on this night, and he answered. That's what a superstar is supposed to do.
Now he needs to do it again on Sunday.
