Inside Jaylen Brown’s stunning three that gave the Celtics the chance to clinch Game 1 (2024)

Celtics

Brown’s three-pointer with 5.7 seconds left secured overtime for Boston and paved the way toward a momentum-shifting 133-128 victory.

By Conor Ryan

May 22, 2024

There was never any doubt hovering in Jaylen Brown’s mind as the final seconds ticked off the clock on Tuesday night.

Not when the Pacers held a three-point lead with 46.1 seconds to go in regulation.

Not when Indiana was a clean inbound pass away from sealing a stunning Game 1 win on Causeway Street.

And especially not with Pascal Siakam draped over him in the left corner — and series-opening loss resting on his last-second heave.

“Before the inbound, I was just talking to myself, ‘If I get the shot, it’s going in,’” Brown said. “I was telling myself the whole time: ‘You get it? It’s going up and it’s going in.’”

Sure enough, Brown got the pass he needed from Jrue Holiday off the timeout. And sure enough, Brown’s first 3-pointer of the night came at just the right time for a reeling Celtics squad.

“It’s simple. Big-time players make big-time plays,” Jayson Tatum said. “That was a hell of a shot he made.”

With Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals hanging in the balance, Brown’s three-pointer with 5.7 seconds left secured overtime for Boston and paved the way toward a momentum-shifting 133-128 victory at a raucous TD Garden.

“It really just felt like we had a second chance, right? At the end of the third and fourth quarter — we didn’t necessarily play well enough, where we may have deserved to win,” Tatum said. “And obviously made some plays at the end. JB gave us a second chance by hitting his shot. And we just talked about it in the huddle. We got a chance, let’s take advantage of it.”

Tatum’s takeover performance beyond regulation (10 points in overtime) might have sealed the win for Boston, but it was Brown who left his fingerprints all over that final-minute rally against a lax Pacers defense.

Brown scored all five of Boston’s points over the final minute of regulation, starting with a pair of clutch free throws that cut Indianapolis’s lead to one with 57.1 seconds to go. A step-back jumper from Andrew Nembhard gave the Pacers some breathing room on the subsequent possession, with a pair of missed shots from Derrick White and Tatum putting Boston on the brink of defeat.

Indiana had the ball and a three-point lead with 8.1 seconds left, with a well-executed inbound feed from Nembhard setting the Pacers on the path to victory.

But Brown had other plans.

With Jrue Holiday smothering Nembhard’s first target in Tyrese Haliburton, the Pacers guard fed the ball to a cutting Siakam. Brown closed in on Siakam as Nembhard made his move — with the ball bouncing off of Siakam’s hands and out of bounds to put the ball back in Boston’s hands.

“Welcome to the NBA Playoffs,” Brown said of Boston’s resiliency in crunch time. “You just gotta manage your emotions of the game. Anything can happen. The game is not over until the final buzzer sounds.

“That was a good example of that. I was able to get the deflection off of Siakam that just extended the game. It’s not over until it’s over.”

After orchestrating one final possession for Boston, Brown forced overtime with his clutch bucket. With White doing just enough to slow down Siakam with a screen, Brown received a clean pass from Holiday — elevating over Siakam and sending a nervous Garden crowd into a frenzy.

“Everybody was thinking the game was lost,” Brown said. “But when that shot goes in, now we’ve got an opportunity again. That gave us a little bit of life — I think that’s fair to say. We found a way to close it.”

Brown’s contributions on both ends of the court paved the way for a comeback win over the Pacers.

But an hour after sinking arguably the biggest shot of his life, Brown was focused more on preventing such a nail-biting result from repeating itself moving forward against this Indiana team.

“I think it’s always great to come out with a win,” Brown admitted. “But obviously we’ve got to tighten up in some areas and we’re gonna watch the film. … We knew they were gonna be fast. It didn’t surprise us, but it’s one thing watching them on film and then seeing it in person.

“They just got out of a dogfight in New York and it just felt like they were just flying by us, getting these layups. We gotta be better, we’ve got to match their intensity if we want to win the series.”