SI

Jayson Tatum Accidentally Heel-Kicked a Ball to Himself for Beautiful Layup

Since the kick was unintentional, it was correctly uncalled by the officiating crew.

Josh Wilson

Tatum scored 26 in the Celtics' win over the Jazz
Tatum scored 26 in the Celtics' win over the Jazz / Screengrab / @HoHighlights on X (formerly Twitter)
In this story:

Plenty of national teams faced off in 2026 World Cup Qualifying play on Friday, which may have had Boston Celtics' superstar Jayson Tatum thinking about using his feet a bit more.

Driving down the lane against the Utah Jazz on Friday night after stealing an errant pass, Tatum ambitiously attempted to dribble behind his back, left-to-right, to get past his first defender, despite a second defender trailing to his right. The second defender occupied his dribble space and jarred the ball loose.

Problem is, as you can see here, neither of the Jazz defenders could get their hands on the loose ball, and it seemingly magically wound up in Tatum's hands for an easy lay-up:

A closer review shows Tatum's heel clipped the ball and happened to kick it up above the defenders in a perfect location for him to grab it and get an easy two points.

Fans might be wondering why a kicked ball violation wasn't called. Section IV of the NBA's Rule No. 10 stipulates that a player can't kick the ball intentionally but that unintentional ball contact with the foot is not a violation.

As cool as this play was, there's no doubt that it was a lucky heel volley more than an attempted kick. If it was, Tatum might want to put his hand up for the struggling USMNT ahead of the 2026 Olympics.

More NBA on Sports Illustrated

feed

Published
Josh Wilson
JOSH WILSON

Josh Wilson is the news director of the Breaking and Trending News team at Sports Illustrated. Before joining SI in 2024, he worked for FanSided in a variety of roles, most recently as senior managing editor of the brand’s flagship site. He has also served as a general manager of Sportscasting, the sports arm of a start-up sports media company, where he oversaw the site’s editorial and business strategy. Wilson has a bachelor’s degree in mass communications from SUNY Cortland and a master’s in accountancy from the Gies College of Business at the University of Illinois. He loves a good nonfiction book and enjoys learning and practicing Polish. Wilson lives in Chicago but was raised in upstate New York. He spent most of his life in the Northeast and briefly lived in Poland, where he ate an unhealthy amount of pastries for six months.

Home/NBA