'Lowest Moment': How Knicks Helped Jayson Tatum & Celtics to NBA Finals
RJ Barrett was credited with 208 assists in his third season with the New York Knicks. Boston Celtics star Jayson Tatum might be ready to give him one more...and it could yield the franchise's 18th NBA championship ring.
Tatum and the Celtics are headed to the 2022 NBA Finals after dispatching the Miami Heat in the Eastern Conference finale over the weekend. The conference title is the latest accolade for a Celtics team that has been firing on all cylinders after posting an 18-21 record near the midway point of the season in January.
Boston looked to be far from title contention after falling three games under .500, a record brought about by a nationally televised 108-105 loss to the Knicks on Jan. 6 at Madison Square Garden. They led by as much as 24 but were victimized by a New York comeback that ended with Barrett's game-winning, buzzer-beating three-pointer as time expired. The winning shot, banked off MSG's glass, came over the outstretched arm of Tatum, Barrett's former collegiate teammate at Duke.
In the aftermath of Boston's 100-96 win in Game 7 of the conference finals on Sunday, Tatum, the winner of the series' MVP Award, credited Barrett's victorious heave as the turning point of the Celtics' season.
"The toughest moment for me was blowing that 24-point lead at New York, and then RJ Barrett hit the game-winning shot over me. That was the lowest moment for me," Tatum, he of a Boston-best 26 points in the win, said. "But I think shortly after that, things started to turn around."
To Tatum's point, the Celtics went on to win 33 of their remaining 43 contests, locking up the second seed in the Eastern playoff bracket. That streak began with a 99-75 win over the Knicks two nights later at TD Garden.
Some believed that the loss to the Knicks would encourage Boston to break up its current core, one headlined by Tatum, Jaylen Brown, and Marcus Smart. Tatum, however, claimed that the outside noise partly brought about by the loss encouraged the team to stay together and gear up for a championship run that seemed improbable in January.
"I think all of those things helped, from saying that we need to split the group up, get rid of somebody or me and (Brown) can't play together, that fueled us to figure it out and not run from it," Tatum said. "I think instead of separating, we became closer, and I think it's shown throughout the season."
As for the Knicks, they failed to capitalize on the momentum that Barrett's winner brought them. They briefly embarked on a three-game winning streak after the home-and-home in question but never surfaced above .500 after that. Following a win over Atlanta on Jan. 15, the Knicks dropped 17 of their next 20, though Barrett served as a consistent silver lining through a new career-best mark in scoring (20 per game).
The 2022 NBA Finals will tip-off on Thursday night in San Francisco, as the Celtics battle the Golden State Warriors (9 p.m. ET, ABC). New York, following a 35-47 season, will choose 11th in the coming NBA Draft on June 23.
