The Boston Celtics would not have made a historic comeback to beat the Golden State Warriors in Game 1 of the 2022 NBA Finals without Jaylen Brown taking control of the offense over the final 12 minutes.
Brown scored 10 of his 24 points in the fourth quarter on 4-of-6 shooting. He also dished out five assists in the final quarter as Boston outscored Golden State 40-16 to take the series opener 120-108 at Chase Center on Thursday night.
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With Jayson Tatum really struggling to score, Brown took charge and got the Celtics' comeback started. The Celtics were trailing by 12 when Brown hit a midrange step-back jumper.
Two possessions later, Brown cut the lead to seven with a 3-point shot. Jordan Poole turned the ball over on the next Warriors trip down the floor. Brown again looked to score, but instead of forcing a bad shot, he found Robert Williams for an alley-oop that pulled Boston within five. The Warriors called timeout as Boston appeared to be seizing momentum.
The Celtics kept pouring it on. Brown made a steal and found Payton Pritchard in transition with a perfect pass for the bucket to trim the deficit to 92-89
The Warriors didn't back down initially. They pushed the lead back up to five at 97-92. Brown again was aggressive and attacked the basket.
Brown scored 10 points with two assists in the first 4:22 of the fourth quarter. And then the 3-point barrage began.
The Celtics eventually took the lead thanks to a couple 3-point shots from both Derrick White and Al Horford. Brown picked up his final assist on an and-1 by Horford that put an exclamation point on the victory.
Brown playing well in the fourth quarter of a playoff game is nothing new. He's shooting 66.7 percent from the field in fourth quarters during the postseason. He's shooting 64.5 percent from 3-point range in the fourth quarter this postseason. He leads all players in fourth quarter scoring in the playoffs.
The Celtics needed someone to step up with Tatum having such a poor shooting night. Brown rose to the challenge, providing much-needed scoring, excellent playmaking and important rebounding (a team-high seven boards).
Brown was a plus-27 in the fourth quarter. White and Horford hit a lot of important shots and they deserve plenty of credit, too. But the reason why the Celtics had a chance to win this game was because Brown took over offensively when the Warriors were poised to run away with the victory early in the fourth quarter.