Jayson Tatum on Sunday poured in an historic 51 points to lead the Boston Celtics to a 112-88 Game 7 victory over the Philadelphia 76ers and into the NBA Eastern Conference Finals.
Tatum added 13 rebounds, five assists and a couple of steals as the Celtics’ suffocating defense neutralized newly minted NBA Most Valuable Player Joel Embiid as Boston booked a return date with the Miami Heat — the team they beat in seven games in last year’s finals.
Jaylen Brown added 25 points for Boston, who broke open a close game in the third quarter as they outscored the 76ers 33-10.
Photo: AFP
Philadelphia went six minutes of the period without a basket and trailed by 26 heading into the fourth, when Boston pushed the lead to 30 with less than four minutes to play.
His 51 points eclipsed the Game 7 record of 50 set by Golden State’s Stephen Curry against the Sacramento Kings in the first round this month.
It was a bounce-back performance for Tatum, who struggled for long stretches in the series and endured a horrific shooting night until drilling four crucial three-pointers in the fourth quarter of the Celtics’ series-extending Game 6 win on Thursday.
He began fashioning his Game 7 masterpiece in the opening minutes.
The 76ers turned an early six-point deficit into a 29-23 lead through one quarter, while a nip-and-tuck second period saw the Celtics up 55-52 at halftime.
Then the Celtics blew it wide open in the third. Tatum scored 17 points in the period, draining four of his six three-pointers as the shell-shocked 76ers struggled, and failed, to find a response.
“Going into Game 6 I was too locked-in, I was too tight, thinking about what I need to do, how many points I need to score,” Tatum said.
After a lighthearted practice on Saturday, Tatum said he was more himself.
“That’s when I play my best is when I’m having fun,” he said.
It was another crushing playoff exit for the 76ers and Embiid, who was held to 15 points on five-of-18 shooting.
Philadelphia’s Doc Rivers fell to 6-10 in Game 7s as a coach. That is the most Game 7 defeats of any NBA coach in history and Rivers remained without a Game 7 win on the road in his coaching career.
The 76ers had the third-best regular-season record behind the Milwaukee Bucks and Boston, but even with Embiid enjoying a great season it failed to translate into post-season success.
They have reached the playoffs for six straight seasons, but have not made it out of the second round.
Tobias Harris led the 76ers with 19 points, but Boston limited the Sixers to 37.3 percent shooting from the floor and harried them into 14 turnovers.
Star guard James Harden scored just nine, making three of his 11 shots from the field.
Boston veteran Al Horford did a terrific job guarding Embiid. He scored just six points, but grabbed 10 rebounds with two steals and three blocked shots.
Rivers said the rot set in for the 76ers in the second quarter.
“We were playing so well. We trusted, the ball was moving, and then we had I think it was three or four turnovers in a row,” Rivers said.
Rivers pointed to a flagrant foul called on Harden after his arm hit Brown in the face as the ball slipped out of Harden’s hands on a layup attempt.
Instead of going up by 10, the Sixers gave up the ball.
“After that, we never played right again,” Rivers said.
The Celtics host the Heat in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference Finals tomorrow with an NBA Finals berth on the line.
Last year, the Heat were the top seeds in the East. This year they are the first eighth-seeded team to reach the conference finals since the 1999 Knicks.
Badminton world No. 3 Anders Antonsen clinched his first Indonesia Open title yesterday after beating Taiwan’s Chou Tien-chen, while South Korea’s An Se-young won her second championship in Jakarta. The 28-year-old Dane sank world No. 7 Chou at the Indonesian capital’s Istora Senayan arena, winning 22-20, 21-14 in a 60-minute match to secure the prestigious Super 1000 event. Antonsen came out on top in a tightly contested first game before cruising to victory in the second. In a more closely fought women’s singles final, South Korean ace and world No. 1 An fought back from one game down to beat China’s
‘STILL’: In front of a packed New Jersey arena attended by Donald Trump and Mike Tyson, UFC 316 delivered high drama as Merab Dvalishvili retained his title Georgia’s Merab Dvalishvili scored a second-round submission win over Sean O’Malley to retain his bantamweight title at Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) 316 on Saturday, with Kayla Harrison also winning by submission in the co-main event, tapping out Juliana Pena to claim the women’s bantamweight crown. In front of a packed crowd at the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey, which included US President Donald Trump and retired heavyweight great Mike Tyson, Dvalishvili, a 34-year-old from the country of Georgia, won the belt in a convincing, although not aesthetically pleasing, unanimous decision. Dvalishvili (19-4) sat on top of the cage and shouted
Manchester City on Monday completed the signing of left-back Rayan Ait-Nouri from Wolverhampton Wanderers for a reported ￡31 million (US$41.8 million). The 24-year-old Algeria international has signed a five-year contract and will be available for the FIFA Club World Cup, which begins later this week. Ait-Nouri is expected to be just one of a trio of new City faces for that tournament with deals close to completion for AC Milan midfielder Tijjani Reijnders and Olympique Lyonnais playmaker Rayan Cherki. After missing out on a major trophy in the recently completed season for the first time since 2016-2017, City are hoping
Hulking Italian sprinter Jonathan Milan on Monday surged away from the pack to win the second stage of the Criterium de Dauphine in Issoire, France, to take the overall lead from Tadej Pogacar. The 1.93m, 87kg Milan had to battle to keep up on a hilly 204.6km run through central France from Premilhat. When the pack hit the home straight, he rocketed away from his rivals to collect a 10-second victory bonus and the yellow jersey. “That was really tough,” Milan said. “I was dropped at one point, and I was really on the limit, but I have to say
RSS