There’s a school of thought among some historians called “The Great Man Theory.” Bear with me here, because I’ve been reading an Abraham Lincoln biography, but I promise this idea ties back to Celtics basketball.
The theory, credited to philosopher Thomas Carlyle, can be summed up this way: major moments in human history are marked by great leaders who are able to defeat their rivals, beat back against the odds, and inspire the masses with their God-given talent.
This kind of hero worship just fits perfectly into sports, and especially basketball – where one player can dominate a game and change a series.
With his team down 0-2 and heading to the arena that is rightly-or-not considered the center of the basketball universe, Jayson Tatum has to be a hero. The only real hope the Celtics have of getting out of Madison Square Garden with the series tied is if their first-team All-NBA star is the agent of the change in the next two games.
Only unserious people deny Tatum’s basketball talent. He’s been a top-five NBA player for four seasons now, and across eight years, he’s tallied 30 playoff games in which he scored 30 or more points. But he hasn’t been in spitting distance of his best in the Eastern Conference Semifinals against the Knicks. He’s averaged just 18 points per game, and gone 5-20 from the 3-point line. He’s also accounted for eight turnovers in the short start of the series. He was effective on the defensive boards in the first half of Game 2 but only had two points during that stretch.
“It’s just taking ownership and knowing that you’ve got to play better. And you know, I will,” he said a day after the Game 2 loss.
He has to. The Celtics will go as Tatum goes, especially when Jaylen Brown looks banged up, and a mystery plague has wiped Kristaps Porzingis out of the series altogether. Historical precedence is heavily stacked against Boston. According to Land of Basketball, in 463 NBA playoff series that had a status of 2-0, only 34 teams, or about 7%, dug themselves out of that hole to win and advance.
The Celtics aren’t on the brink of elimination, but they’re eyeing the doorstep. To lose in this series would be following in the footsteps of the last three NBA champions, (the Nuggets, Warriors, and Bucks), who each exited the playoffs in the second round the year after they won. That’s a league pattern; it certainly wasn’t how anyone drew it up when they ran the most expensive team in NBA back for another year.
Tatum has played the hero at least once before. In Game 6 of the 2022 Eastern Conference Semifinals, he put up 46 points to save the Celtics from the Bucks, and they went on to win the series, and eventually, punch their first ticket to the Finals. The Celtics would have been dead in the water without him in that spot.
There’s been a lot of talk in these playoffs about clutch.
Tyrese Haliburton stunned the top-seeded Cavaliers in Game 2 of their own second-round series with his dagger shot (and subsequently hilarious celebration), and Reggie Miller cannot go two minutes without mentioning Jalen Brunson’s NBA clutch credentials on broadcasts. The thing is, Tatum’s clutch (and super clutch) numbers improved significantly from last season to this one. In the 2023-24 regular season, Tatum was a 51% clutch shooter (league average was 46%), but just 24% in super clutch moments (think buzzer-beaters). This year, he’s a 56% shooter in the clutch, and 46% in super clutch. So while he hasn’t performed well in the clutch through two games, past performance suggests the tide should turn, and the shots should fall, barring any significant outside issues. We haven’t heard any of those. Tatum’s still slapping his wrist in celebration when he makes 3-pointer, but the bone bruise from the last series didn’t keep him from averaging 36 points through the last three games against Orlando.
Whether you agree or disagree with his 3-point shooting philosophy, Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla understands how his team has to show up in Game 3 Saturday.
“People don’t become who they say they want to become unless they transition in these moments,” he said Thursday afternoon.
It’s not the Red Sox down 0-3 in the 2004 ALCS, or Tom Brady’s 28-3 in Atlanta, but the stakes are high, and the stage is set for Tatum to rise to the occasion.