Jaylen Brown celebrated his Eastern Conference Player of the Month award for January prior to tip-off of the Celtics 124-105 win over the Chicago Bulls Wednesday night at TD Garden.
The league MVP candidate got a standing ovation from the home crowd as he got to shared the moment with his mother at midcourt ahead of NBA All-Star Weekend. Brown, who got his fifth All-Star nod and first as a starter, has been enjoying plenty of career-highs and firsts during the 2025-26 campaign.
The Celtics, who many believed were not going to be very competitive this season, have turned heads as one of the association's best teams heading into the All-Star break and Brown's play and leadership has been the primary reason why.
While it remains to be seen -- despite recent reports and updates -- if Jayson Tatum will return at any point this season or not from a torn Achilles, Brown has picked up the baton and has not only ran with it but has led the Celtics to the second best record in the Eastern Conference at 35-19.
The now five-time All-Star is enjoying the best season of his 10-year career with averages of 29.3 points (tied for third best in the league with Anthony Edwards and also a career-high) on 48.3% shooting from the field, 34.8% from 3-point range and 77.5% from the free throw line. Brown is also putting up 6.9 rebounds and 4.7 assists per contest, which are both a career-best so far through 49 games played.
Brown has reached the 30-point plateau 26 times, including nine-straight games of scoring 30 or more -- tying a 40-year-old franchise record set by Larry Bird in 1985. The game prior to this season's historic streak, Brown recorded a triple-double of 19 points, 12 rebounds and 13 assists in an impressive 117-115 win over the Cavaliers in Cleveland. The game where it was believed Brown would clinch a new Celtic record, the wing put up 23 points and 10 assists in a 129-119 victory in Utah, to avenge a prior home loss to the Jazz just weeks earlier.
Let's not forget the fact that Brown has also notched five 40-point performances this season, including a 50-piece (tying a career-high) to snap the Clippers six-game win streak a day following being snubbed for Player of the Month honors for December -- when the Celtics All-Star was the reigning Player of the Week and had won it twice that month only to lose the big award to Jalen Brunson, despite having better overall stats, the better team record and even Joe Mazzulla won Coach of the Month for December.
Meanwhile, even when Brown doesn't score 30 points, the Celtics still find ways to win -- as they are 18-9 in such games and also 4-1 when Brown has sat out this season -- an interesting stat that means the offense doesn't just rely on if Brown has a good offensive performance or not.
The Celtics find themselves with in the top three when it comes to offensive (second) and net (third) rating, something Brown posted Thursday of where the team was at this time a season ago and now, with the caption "I'm very proud of this group and staff."
"It's been great." Tatum told reporters Tuesday of Brown and the rest of the Celtics so far. "Even before the season, there was no doubt in my mind that [Jaylen], and P [Payton Pritchard] and D-White and all these guys, I knew what they were capable of. Whenever somebody that loves the game that much, and works as hard as they do, gain more opportunity, I’m not surprised [by] what they've been able to accomplish. It's been really fun to see."
In the last three months the Celtics are 30-12 after an disappointing 5-7 start to what many believed would be a "bridge year," with only the Oklahoma City Thunder (31-12) and Detroit Pistons (31-11) having a slightly better record in that span -- but not by much.
After last week's NBA trade deadline moves that team president of basketball operations Brad Stevens pulled off, including finally acquiring Nikola Vučević days prior, to evade any first and second apron penalties, plus avoid a luxury-tax bill altogether -- the future looks bright for not just this season but for the next few years as they look to keep adding to a championship core with a prime Brown and Tatum at the helm.
As Brown heads to Los Angeles as the lone All-Star representing the Celtics this weekend, he gets to celebrate not just a good first-half start as one of the best stories in the NBA, but also look forward to what's to come the rest of this season and beyond.
Joel Pavón
No comments:
Post a Comment