Terry Rozier, Al Horford, and Jayson Tatum had themselves a night on Monday against the Sixers — but it’s better than you can possibly imagine. The trio combined for 83 points, and the context of that number is staggering.
Terry Rozier, Al Horford, and Jayson Tatum just did something KG, Paul Pierce, and Ray Allen never did
The Celtics are getting ‘Big 3’ numbers from Horford, Rozier, and Tatum
Photo by Maddie Meyer/Getty Images
James Dator has been covering a wide range of sports for SB Nation for over a decade, with a special focus on the NFL.
Keep in mind how momentous this is in context. The Celtics’ legendary new big three, which won an NBA Championship in 2008 and took almost every resource the Celtics had to acquire, just got out-scored by two draft picks and a free agent signing, only one of which was supposed to be a starter on this year’s team. Not to mention Rozier, Horford, and Tatum did it in a playoff game, against a really good Sixers’ team.
In fact, the trio on Monday night were just 17 points off matching a truly legendary performance by Larry Bird, Robert Parish, and Kevin McHale, who scored 100 against the Houston Rockets in March 1985.
But it’s not really about how close Rozier, Horford, and Tatum were to making history on Monday night, it’s the fact we’re having this conversation. It’s that we’re actively looking up statistics from decades-old games to see how close these guys came to matching three Hall of Famers. That’s who the Celtics have become this season, in spite of most people counting them out when Gordon Hayward got injured, then once again when Kyrie Irving went down.
The Celtics’ third, forth, and fifth options on a healthy team delivered one of the best scoring performances in team history. It truly defies belief.
See More:
