Denver Jayson Tatum had the ball in his hands with an opportunity to put the Boston Celtics up in the final seconds for the second time this week and twice this season against the Denver Nuggets.
Tatum fell short of the chance once again.
With 45 seconds remaining and the Celtics trailing by two, Tatum missed a wide-open corner 3-pointer to cap off a terrible performance on what proved to be Boston’s last opportunity to grab the lead. Following the miss, Nikola Jokic completed a triple-double of 32 points, 12 rebounds, and 11 assists by dishing the ball to Aaron Gordon, who dunk to increase Denver’s lead to 115-109.
Tatum was so passive the entire game that it was amazing Boston (48-14) had a chance to win. In addition to four rebounds and eight assists, he finished with fifteen points on five of thirteen shots. Tatum missed a wide-open three, made many passive drives to the hoop in the fourth quarter, and was overall not as involved as he usually is. He also committed a couple of critical turnovers in transition.
When asked about his performance, Tatum responded, “I think with our team’s dynamic, when other guys kind of got it going in a rhythm, in a flow… you got to space the floor.” “Respecting the space of others is something we always talk about. We’re trying to do that on that possession if it means being in the corner or passing them the ball. You must respect that.”
With an incredible 41 points, 14 rebounds, 4 assists, and 2 steals in under 41 minutes, Jaylen Brown kept the Celtics in the game. However, they frequently lost games due to careless play, which allowed the Nuggets (43-20) to lead 16–6 in points off turnovers and shoot 11–38 (28.9%) from three-point range.
Brown remarked, “Just too many mistakes.” “We have to take advantage of a strong team. We need to improve on turnovers, free throws, and simply missing defensive assignments, among other things.And Jayson is the first to do that; it begins with me at the top. We lost the game because we committed too many mistakes.”
The Nuggets, especially Jokic, who received a second chance, were merciless in taking advantage of those errors.
Leave a Reply