The Celtics would love to score 125 points, hit 18 3-pointers, and watch Baylor Scheierman get a little playoff experience under his belt.
Instead, the rookie’s only contribution has been Jayson Tatum’s new wrist-grabbing 3-point celebration.
“Shoutout to the rook, man, Baylor. He came up with the celebration when I hit a three,” Tatum said. “I think people are taking notice, and it's a new thing for now."
What isn’t new is Tatum carrying the Celtics when they need someone to do something. The Orlando Magic might be the seventh seed, but they’ve been the league’s second-best defense all season long and they are showing why in this series. They have figured out he best chance they have is to force Tatum and Jaylen Brown to carry more of the workload, and it’s mostly working.
“I think they're staying at home a lot, so just forcing me and JT to make plays over their guys,” Brown said. “JT did great at that tonight. You know, I could be better. … JT made them pay tonight in his spots, he was able to get to the free throw line, etc. But I think we can be, I can be even better.”
Brown had his moment in Game 2, which was an important win without Tatum. Tatum’s turn came in Game 4, with the Celtics teetering on the edge of going back to Boston tied instead of up 3-1. Brown was playing okay, but not great. The same with Kristaps Porzingis, who is still trying to adjust to the Magic’s defense. And because Orlando was hell bent on not letting someone else beat them, it was all on Tatum to close things out.
“I've been here a bunch of times. I understand the environment.” Tatum said. “You understand the moment. Game 4, you could go up two games or it could be tied. Come out with the mindset from the start of the game that I'm locked in. It's not time to be friendly out here. Not time to be nothing besides knowing what it takes to win and doing whatever it takes. I think that's the fun part of it."
I wouldn’t call what the Magic are doing to the Celtics fun. This is a 3-1 Celtics lead, but we can easily cherry pick five plays from Boston’s last two wins and find ways to flip those results. But Orlando is inexperienced. Sure, they also have a star forward from Duke, but Paolo Banchero is still figuring out the nuances of winning tight playoff games. Tatum has it figured out.
“just poise. Poise and having an understanding of your environment,” Joe Mazzulla said. “Obviously some shot making there, but at the same time, physical drives, getting to the free throw line. At the end of the day, both teams were playing physical. You have to be able to execute at both ends of the floor, and I thought he did a great job of that.”
Tatum and Banchero each hit three shots in the fourth quarter, but it was Tatum walking off with his hands raised, having finished the quarter with 16 points while Banchero scored six. That's because Tatum was a perfect 9-9 from the free throw line while Banchero didn’t get there at all.
“I thought in my head, like, ‘This guy is special,’” Porzingis said. “I think also, from when I got here to now, he’s developed more of a killer instinct and he’s been getting us big buckets in this series and last year’s playoffs. … today again he was phenomenal.”
The Celtics are at their best when Tatum is drawing two and then spraying the ball. He has 11 assists total in three games played against Orlando. The Celtics would prefer him to get those in bigger bunches, maybe even all in one game.
But that's just not possible right now. It’s not just a matter of guys missing the shots Tatum creates, he’s just not able to create many.
“Playoffs presents a lot of different things,” Tatum said. “Each game is different, and I say it all the time. Sometimes you've just got to beat your matchup. Sometimes you've just got to be able to make a play for you or somebody else. And I think we did that pretty well tonight."
Things might change if the Celtics move on to face the Knicks, who are also up 3-1 in their opening round series. That's an offense-first team that tries to play defense, which means the Celtics will look much better in that series than they do in this one. And after everything they had to go through against Orlando, a series with obvious weak spots to attack would be a welcome change of pace. Then Tatum can get back to the guy who did a little bit of everything for the Celtics instead of being a more one-dimensional scorer.
Not that Tatum minds.
"You just want to be in a position where you're involved and you've got a part of the action or whatever when the game's on the line,” he said. “It was 91-91 with four minutes left, a timeout, I was excited for that moment because I knew we was going to figure it out and make plays. It's not just me. Everybody made plays. So we showed just our competitive spirit. That was fun."
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