NBA News NBA News, Match Reports and Updates
BOSTON — The lifespan of confetti comes in three stages. Monday’s tiny cuts of white and green paper began streaming toward the TD Garden rafters, where an 18th championship banner will soon join the others and assorted retired numbers, after Boston clinched the 2024 NBA title with a 106-88 Game 5 victory over Dallas. It blasted from eight different cannons along the baselines after Celtics assistant Sam Cassell dead-on sprinted across the parquet to corral the game ball.
The confetti just rises from there. Instant, expected, like a five-star prospect such as Jayson Tatum, who played his college ball at Duke and who’s now made first-team All-NBA each of the past three seasons and is therefore expected to compete for rings. His rise was just so damn instant. As was Jaylen Brown’s. As was Boston’s, not more than four seasons following a gutty decision to move on from Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce before it was too late. Those fabled picks from Brooklyn netted back these two All-Stars. There’s since grown a sentiment around this building that it’s taken Tatum and Brown so long, perhaps too long, to climb this mountaintop. Brown saw the conference finals as a rookie in 2017. And then again in 2018, with a first-year Tatum keeping pace.
Boston Celtics forward Jayson Tatum sprays Champagne while celebrating after defeating the Dallas Mavericks in Game 5 to win the NBA title Monday, June 17, 2024, in Boston. (Elsa/Pool Photo via AP)
They’ve been hovering at that stratosphere for longer than most, that is true. Tatum and Brown played 107 playoff games together before clinching their first championship — the highest mark in NBA history for a duo. They’ve reached the conference finals in six of the last eight seasons, the Finals two of the last three. These Celtics have been shimmering and soaring, and yet somehow staying in the same place. Like a swarm of bees readying to sting. Like confetti readying to fall.
That’s the final act, fluttering toward the ground like little feathers. There’s just a stark lightness to its descent, floating down like a dream, compared to the confetti’s violent…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/2024-nba-finals-scenes-from-a-long-awaited-celtics-championship-celebration-141246671.html
Author : Yahoo Sports
Publish date : 2024-06-18 14:12:46
Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source.
