Jayson Tatum Changed his Game and Made Celtics a Must-Watch Team

The crowds to see Jayson Tatum, and maybe sneak an autograph, grew mildly larger again at TD Garden after he received standing ovations and MVP chants in Charlotte on Wednesday. The attention toward the star grows with each passing Celtics win, 30-point performance, sold jersey and step up the MVP ladder he takes. He entered Friday night’s entry into Kevin Garnett weekend No. 6 on the NBA.com hierarchy with the Celtics seeking their 23rd win over their last 29 in front of Paul Pierce and varying levels of team icons, all the way down through Kelly Olynyk.

Tatum put on a show again, coming back from down seven points in the second half with another 30-point performance, his fifth in a row. Through frustrating calls, no-calls and physicality now emblematic of the trouble the Pistons have caused Boston all season, Tatum kept his head downhill save for a first half fadeaway and step-back three that established his jump shot. He hung from the rim with one arm and blew a kiss to the crowd following his final three, the former a new layer to his evolving aesthetic as a player, the latter a tribute to Deuce.

“It’s impressive,” Ime Udoka said last week. “At times you forget how young they all are out there … these guys at 23, 24, 25 years old stepping up to the plate. That confidence they have in themselves, we all have in them, and just taking the alpha approach to be the best guy on the court each nights. That’s what’s needed against some of these high-level opponents. He takes pride in the matchups going against high-level guys. We’re not making it a one-on-one thing, but he wants to play well and he takes pride in it. Impressive for sure, but not unexpected.”

Tatum’s 31 points, eight rebounds and six assists capped a five-game win streak where Tatum dropped 199 points (39.8 per game) that fell just short of Larry Bird’s record. The Celtics beat the Pistons, 114-103, with Marcus Smart’s defense and Tatum’s pace that followed digging Boston out of a seven-point second half deficit to a pesky Pistons team that’s bothered the Celtics with physically all season.

His game has shifted to embrace that physicality, adding muscle over each of the past two seasons to become a physically-imposing player in the lane. It took time for Tatum to adapt from playing finesse basketball in the lane and trying to avoid defenders and score at odd angles, into powering through opponents and drawing free throws. Tatum shot 6-for-8 at the rim in the first half, matching his season averaging for shots at the rim early in the second quarter.

The passing signifies what truly changed the look of his game though. While Tatum did drive-and-kick liberally last year to questionable perimeter shooters, he didn’t fire off skip passes as sharply, or escape the double teams as sharply, or get in the lane and reposition himself for second-level attacks.

Boston’s defense now hits in waves, counteracting the shooting woes the team still has, finishing 6-for-32 (18.8%) from deep in Friday’s win with downhill activity in transition and the half court.

“A lot of times, early in the year, that would kind of spell doom for us,” Udoka said post-game on Friday. “To score the amount we did … our offense has improved where we’re not relying on the three as much. We’re getting downhill. We got a ton of free throws, 30 tonight, and so guys are figuring it out.”

Teams can’t blitz Tatum as easily as they could in the past. The zone doesn’t work as well as a deterrent as it did for the Heat in the 2020 east finals. He’s making the right reads, using the fast break to play against set defenses less often than the league average and when crunch time arrives, Udoka puts Jaylen Brown and Tatum in close proximity in sets.

Kyrie Irving talked about Boston picking the scab in the Celtics’ win over the Nets a week ago, running the same set play over and over again where Tatum would screen for a ball-handler to slip to the free throw line area against a switch onto Seth Curry.

Tatum did the same to Hornets defenders on Wednesday and Cory Joseph early and often on Friday. The new Tatum plays closer to the basket, able to make his move before the defense collapses or be in advantageous positions to kick the ball out. Brown is making himself available in the lane. The bigs are sneaking free across the baseline. This offense works.

They’re a much more fun team to watch too, Tatum part of the disruptiveness on defense that forced four turnovers on Detroit early in the fourth quarter. Smart, Tatum and Derrick White pounced on loose balls and ran the floor in transition to turn a 92-90 lead at the end of the third quarter into an 18-point advantage by the end of the game.

The Celtics learned over the past two seasons what habits don’t work, each loss slowly instilled that, so it’s not surprising to see Tatum and them lean into the new ones that have started yielding nightly wins. Udoka wanted to marry Tatum’s lethal individual scoring ability to connect with teammates. He’s finally starting to use his own abilities to make teammates like Robert Williams III and Grant Williams better. His play embodies leadership, while the rest of the team falls into their roles.

“Jayson Tatum is a great player. It’s a statement I keep saying. I’m gonna keep saying it. It’s so much fun playing with him. It’s so easy playing with him. It’s a relief on everybody else. He’s a great player. Him and Jaylen Brown, I wanna add JB to this. I’m proud of how they’ve been taking this adversity, everything we went through at the beginning of the year … how they’ve been responding.”

Detroit did expose the areas where Tatum and the Celtics still need to work on. He fell into the the row of photographers at one point underneath the basket, slow to return to play in frustration over a no-call. He drew a technical foul midway through the third quarter in a 69-69 game.

Brown also nearly threw down the dunk of the year, missing and complaining while Derrick White recovered the rebound and fired a pass over Brown and out-of-bounds, Brown not noticing while distracted by the officiating.

“We say what we’ve got to say and then we got to move on,” Smart said. “We realize the more we talk and the more we allow ourselves to talk, it can take us out of our game and we don’t want that to happen … we snap back and it’s like, alright we got to continue to play. We can’t continue to talk, just go play now … I think that’s been a big key for us, saying what we’ve got to say and moving on. Then not letting it affect us … when that does affect us, we’re not a good team.”

Boston recovered and won the game, and while they mercifully won’t see the Pistons in the postseason, the style Detroit embraced against them is one they’ll surely see on their way to a championship. The Bucks, Suns, along with the Mavericks and Warriors they’ll see this week all play defense at the physical level the Celtics do. That’s why Tatum’s growth, physically and as a leader, proved so important in Boston ascending to this level. The team can only be the offense and defense they want to be if Tatum sets the tone by doing the little things at both ends.

“The physicality piece,” Udoka said. “That’s who we are and so we have to embrace that, play through it and that’s how the playoffs are going to be. So it’s a nice test late in the season. It’s good to see that. You don’t want it easy every night. You have to figure out ways to win, score and defend against certain matchups. Every team has a different style. This one, size-wise and physicality-wise, matches up well with us. I’m happy we can figure out how to get it done, keep our composure, play through and then lock in defensively when we need to.”