Jayson Tatum leads the Boston Celtics to their 18th NBA Championship with a 106-88 victory over the Dallas Mavericks, breaking their tie with the Los Angeles Lakers for the most titles in league history.
Boston, Bollywood Fever: The Boston Celtics once again stand alone as the champions of the NBA.
Jayson Tatum scored 31 points, dished out 11 assists, and grabbed eight rebounds to lead the Celtics to a 106-88 victory over the Dallas Mavericks on Monday night, securing the franchise’s 18th championship. This win breaks the tie with the Los Angeles Lakers for the most titles in NBA history.
Boston’s latest triumph comes on the 16th anniversary of their last championship in 2008. This marks the 13th championship won this century by one of Boston’s Big 4 professional sports franchises.
Jaylen Brown contributed 21 points and was named the NBA Finals MVP. Jrue Holiday added 15 points and 11 rebounds, while center Kristaps Porzingis provided an emotional lift, returning from a two-game absence due to a dislocated tendon in his left ankle to chip in five points in 17 minutes.
This victory capped a dominant postseason for the Celtics, who finished with a 16-3 record and an overall record of 80-21. Their .792 winning percentage is second only to the 1985-86 Celtics team that finished with a .820 winning percentage.
At 35, second-year coach Joe Mazzulla became the youngest coach since Bill Russell in 1969 to lead a team to a championship.
Luka Doncic led the Mavericks with 28 points and 12 rebounds, but Dallas was unable to extend the series after avoiding a sweep with a Game 4 win. The Mavericks had been 3-0 in Game 5s this postseason, with Doncic scoring at least 31 points in each of them.
Kyrie Irving scored 15 points on 5-of-16 shooting and has now lost 13 of his last 14 games against the Celtics, the team he left in 2019 to join the Brooklyn Nets.
NBA teams are now 0-157 in postseason series after falling into a 3-0 deficit.
Boston never trailed in the game and led by as many as 26 points, feeding off the energy of the Garden crowd.
Dallas was within 16-15 early in the game, but the Celtics closed the first quarter on a 12-3 run, with Tatum and Brown combining for eight points.
The Celtics repeated this performance in the second quarter when the Mavericks cut a 15-point deficit to nine. Boston responded with a 19-7 run, capped by a half-court buzzer-beater by Payton Pritchard, his second of the series, giving Boston a 67-46 halftime lead.
Over the last two minutes of the first and second quarters, the Celtics outscored the Mavericks 22-4.
The Celtics maintained their lead throughout the game.
Jeannine Russell, widow of Bill Russell, and his daughter Karen Russell were in attendance at TD Garden to celebrate the new generation of Celtics champions.
They watched as Tatum and Brown, both All-Stars, earned their first rings. The trade that sent 2008 champions Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce to Brooklyn in 2013 netted the Celtics the draft picks used to select Brown and Tatum third overall in 2016 and 2017.
This season, the duo led a Celtics team built around high-volume three-point shooting and a league-best defense.
After reaching the Eastern Conference finals four times previously, Tatum and Brown’s fifth playoff run together proved successful.
Both players found their rhythm in Game 5, combining for 31 points and 11 assists in the first half.
Their performance highlighted the attributes that made Boston the NBA’s most formidable team this postseason: spreading the floor, sharing the ball, and playing stifling defense.
This championship victory caps a whirlwind two-year stretch for the Celtics, who lost to the Golden State Warriors in the 2022 finals and fell short last season after a Game 7 home loss to the Miami Heat in the conference finals.
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