BOSTON – Jayson Tatum’s 31 points, 8 rebounds and 11 assists and Finals MVP Jaylen Brown’s 21 points, 8 rebounds and 6 assists helped the Boston Celtics beat the Dallas Mavericks 106-88 to win the 2024 NBA Finals, winning a record 18th NBA title on the 16th anniversary of winning their 17th championship in the same building.
In doing so, the Celtics surpassed their arch-rivals, the Los Angeles Lakers, for most titles in NBA history.
“I mean, this is going to be a night I’ll remember for the rest of my life, the game, the celebration, these moments,” Tatum said. “Over the last couple of years, we’ve had some tough losses at home in the playoffs. We’ve lost NBA championships at home in front of our fans. A couple of years ago we had a chance to beat Miami in Game 6 and we lost that one.
“So to get a big win – the biggest win you can get in front of your home crowd – I felt it was very important to go out there and do everything in my power to make sure we win this game tonight.”
After playing its worst game of the season in its first chance to end this series on Friday night, Boston responded with a resounding win on Monday. Superb performances from Tatum and Brown allowed Boston to close out the game as quickly as possible — just as it did in 2008, when the Celtics won their most recent championship by beating the Lakers in Game 6 at TD Garden.
The Celtics built a 21-point lead at halftime, with Payton Pritchard’s second half-court heave of the series taking them into the break with a comfortable lead — and sending a packed TD Garden crowd into a frenzy.
The crowd was excited even before the game began, but especially when Kristaps Porzingis — who sat out Games 3 and 4 because of a left leg injury suffered in Game 2 — joined the game midway through the first quarter. Porzingis scored just five points in 16 minutes but gave Boston some valuable minutes off the bench due to keeping Al Horford out.
Meanwhile, Kyrie Irving continued to struggle in Boston, admitting Sunday that he had trouble playing against his former team at TD Garden. After making a combined 13 of 37 shots in Games 1 and 2 in Boston, including making 8 of 3 shots, he scored 15 points on 5 of 16 shots in Game 5.
Brown earned his MVP award based on series averages of 20.8 points, 5.4 rebounds, and 5 assists, while also consistently defending Mavericks superstar Luka Doncic.
“I can’t put my feelings into words,” Brown said. “I’m blessed and I’m grateful. It was a total team effort. We had a great team. My teammates were great. They let me lead us on both sides of the ball and we came out on our home field and did well. It’s really amazing.”
“You know, it could have happened to anybody. It could have happened to Jason. Jason, I can’t say enough about his selflessness. … I can’t say enough about his attitude. It’s about his approach to not just this series or the Finals, but the playoffs in general. And we did it together as a team, and that was the most important thing.”
With the win, the Celtics finished the playoffs at 16-3, second only to the 2016-17 Golden State Warriors (16-1) since the NBA began contesting four best-of-seven rounds of the playoffs in 2003, completely reversing Boston’s recent playoff disappointments. The Celtics – until Monday night’s win – had played more postseason games than any team in NBA history over an eight-season span without a title.
That run included going to the Eastern Conference Finals six times, including a seven-game loss to the Heat last year when Boston became the fourth team to force a Game 7 after falling behind 3-0. There was also a loss to the Warriors in the 2022 NBA Finals, when they won two of the first three games and had a lead in the fourth quarter of Game 4 before Golden State celebrated their fourth title of the Stephen Curry era at Boston’s famous Parkette.
The title fulfilled expectations for many of Boston’s top players. For Tatum and Brown, they played 107 games together, the most by any pair before winning their first NBA championship.
“It means so much to the world,” Tatum said on stage. “It’s been a long time coming. And, truly, I’m grateful.”
Tatum had the fifth-most career playoff points at the time of his first championship—trailing only the late Jerry West, LeBron James, Dirk Nowitzki, and Kevin Durant.
Meanwhile, Horford played 186 playoff games before his first title — the most in NBA history before winning a championship.
“The first thing you have to do when you come here is accept that pressure,” Horford said. “And I loved being in that position. If we got criticized and didn’t get the job done, it didn’t bother me because I understood what it meant to play here.
“Our group has been through a lot of adversity the last couple of years. There was the heartbreak in Game 7 against Miami last year. Last year against Golden State. It’s all adding up. But this team has been resilient and we’ve kept working. I’m very proud of Jaylen and I’m very proud of Jason. Both of those guys have been constantly growing. People have been critical of them all year, there’s a lot of expectations and pressure on them.”
“They did it. And they did it at a young age. They led our group. I’m very proud of those guys and they need to put everything aside and focus on winning.”
Monday marked the culmination of a journey that began 11 years ago this month at Barclays Center, when the Brooklyn Nets made a blockbuster trade with Boston that acquired Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett for draft picks, two of which became Brown and Tatum in 2016 and 2017.
Shortly after the 2013 draft, Boston hired Brad Stevens out of Butler University as head coach, a job he held for the next eight seasons before he replaced Danny Ainge — the man who hired him — as president of basketball operations in 2021.
At the time, Boston was coming off a .500 season and lost five games to the Nets in the first round of the playoffs. Since then, Stevens has systematically rebuilt the roster around Brown and Tatum — bringing back Horford that summer and Derrick White at the ensuing trade deadline — helping Boston reach the 2022 Finals. After losing in the conference finals last spring, Stevens rebuilt the roster, adding Porzingis while trading away fan favorite and former Defensive Player of the Year Marcus Smart, then moving to acquire Jrue Holiday after the Milwaukee Bucks traded him to the Portland Trail Blazers.
Holiday, who won the title with Milwaukee in 2021, had several great performances during this postseason, including Game 2 of the Finals when he scored 26 points on 11-14 shooting while the rest of the team went cold from 3-point range. Injuries forced Porzingis to miss all but six of Boston’s postseason games, but he scored 20 points off the bench in Game 1 of the Finals to help the Celtics get off to a strong start against the Mavericks before giving himself an emotional boost with his return on Monday night.
Stevens also made the bold decision to bring Joe Mazzulla from behind the bench to become the team’s head coach in the wake of Ime Udoka’s suspension and eventual dismissal for violating team rules shortly before training camp. Mazzulla, 35, has compiled a 121-43 regular-season record over the past two years and became the youngest coach to win an NBA title since Russell did it for the same franchise 55 years ago.
The Celtics had largely controlled the first three games of this series before the Mavericks demolished Boston in Dallas on Friday, winning by 38 points in the third-largest blowout in NBA Finals history and the biggest loss for the Celtics in any game since the 2017 conference finals.
But Boston recorded its most complete win of the season in Game 5 – and, as a result, set a new standard for winning in NBA history.
“It’s unreal. I don’t think it’s really happened and solidified,” White said. “This is a special group of guys, a special coaching staff that I’m thankful to be a part of. Yeah, it’s unreal. I’m just trying to enjoy the moment and not get too excited.”
