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2026-27 · Regular season
Jayson Tatum scores 40 with an overtime buzzer-beater and says he’s done thinking about his Achilles: ‘Totally, totally different’
Tatum's turnaround at the overtime horn beat Brooklyn 125-124 for his first 40-point game since tearing his Achilles. He said the mental hurdle from last spring is gone, that he may have 'took tomorrow for granted,' and that Klay Thompson told him to give himself grace.
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Jayson Tatum scored 40 points and hit a turnaround jumper at the overtime buzzer as the Boston Celtics beat the Brooklyn Nets 125-124 on Tuesday night. It was his first 40-point game since he came back in March from a torn right Achilles, and afterward he said the bigger win for him is that he has stopped thinking about his body on the floor.
“When I came back in the spring, I was cleared to play and all the things, but you know, there’s still a mental hurdle,” Tatum said. “When I first came back, those 20 games that I played, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t thinking about it, you know, at least at some point every game, like it was on my mind.”
Now, he said, it is different. “Practicing, playing, driving downhill, whatever it may be, the thought process of just like, you know, just thinking about the game and what’s going on and not necessarily thinking about my body is what I’m talking about pre-injury, just that mindset,” he said.
Tatum’s game-winner at the overtime buzzer, posted by the NBA on X.
‘I knew I had probably two dribbles’
Tatum went 10-of-20 from the field and 18-of-22 at the line, with eight assists, five rebounds and no turnovers in 42 minutes. The 22 free-throw attempts were a career high. He did it on the second night of a back-to-back, a day after Boston beat Chicago 134-99, and the Celtics are now 3-1 with three straight wins. Paul George added 20 points and Derrick White had 16.
The Nets led 124-123 when Boston took over with 2.3 seconds left in overtime. Tatum took the inbounds pass from White and hit a 17-foot turnaround jumper, and the review confirmed it was out of his hand in time. “Yeah, just run some off-ball action, force a switch,” Tatum said of the play. “I knew I had probably two dribbles. Just try and get to a spot, get a clean look.”
Asked what it felt like to hit his first game-winner since the injury, he said: “That was a hell of a feeling. You know, just kind of getting back to doing things that, you know, I used to do before I was injured and sharing that moment with my teammates on the court, seeing them rally and, you know, be excited for me.”
He said the make or miss is not what excites him most right now. “I’m 18 months out from when I tore my Achilles,” he said, adding that there are moments in games “where, you know, I’m doing a cut or exploding or just doing something that, you know, something in my mind clicks.” He said that feeling “is really starting to feel like, you know, pre-injury.” Asked if those movements feel different than they did last spring, he answered: “Totally, totally different.”
The NBA noted it was the seventh game-winning shot of his career in the last three seconds, the most of any player since the start of the 2019-20 season. He also joined Larry Bird, who did it twice, as the only Celtics to score 40 or more and hit a buzzer-beater in the same game, and his third career buzzer-beater tied Bill Sharman for third in team history, behind Paul Pierce with six and Bird with four. He is also the second Celtic, after Bird, with at least 35 points, eight assists and zero turnovers in a game.
‘Maybe I took tomorrow for granted’
Asked what is driving him this season, Tatum talked about the time away. “Really just about being present. I think I learned a lot about myself when I was injured,” he said. “We just won a championship, I felt great. I just thought we had this window of trying to win as many championships as possible with that team and, you know, then it just, it all changed.”
“I never took the game for granted, but … maybe I took tomorrow for granted,” he said. “Once something is taken away from you, innately you just kind of appreciate it more. So, you know, I didn’t come into the season trying to prove anything. … I was grateful to be in training camp. I was grateful to be in preseason. I was grateful to play the first game, opening in Detroit. So it’s just, like I said, a sense of gratitude and joy of being in this process again.”
He said he does not see himself as the same person he was before. “Once you go through something traumatic like that, like, you’re never going to be the same person, right?” he said. “As a player and as a person, yeah, a different person. And that’s to be expected.”
Klay Thompson’s advice
Tatum said he does not want to be the face of Achilles injuries, but he said support from other players “is very underrated and it goes a very long way.” He mentioned talking with Tyrese Haliburton, who is coming back from the same injury, and Kevin Durant. He said Klay Thompson reached out after his first game back, “telling me be patient and give yourself some grace like that, that meant a lot.”
He also said there is “no indictment on any other player” when it comes to playing back-to-backs this soon. “Everybody’s body is different,” he said, adding that everything after he got hurt was the best-case scenario, from surgery the next day to being ready early for every step of the rehab. “Being relatively young helps, and I worked really, really, really, really hard to come back,” he said.
‘That was on me’
Boston nearly won it in regulation. Tatum found White for a dunk and a three-point play in the final minute for a 114-111 lead, but he split two free throws with 4.2 seconds left. Neemias Queta was then called for a loose-ball foul, and after Julius Randle made one of two and Boston missed two more free throws, Nets rookie Mikel Brown Jr. tied the game with a three with one second left.
“I should never miss the free throw,” Tatum said. “… So it’s like, yeah, maybe Neemie shouldn’t have fouled, but I should have never put Neemie in that situation by missing the free throw. So that was on me.” He also said he banged knees with Randle late in regulation and had “a little stinger” that made him sit down for a moment.
When he was asked about Jaylen Brown, Tatum shut the topic down. “Listen, I said my piece. Not making any more comments on that situation, OK?” he said.
Tatum declining to talk about Brown again, posted by Justin Turpin on X.
George kept his praise simple. “We got the ball to the MVP and he took us home,” he said.
George on Tatum’s night, posted by Justin Turpin on X.
The Celtics host Chicago again on Friday at 7:30 p.m. ET, which is 1:30 a.m. Saturday in Cairo after Egypt’s clocks go back an hour on Thursday night.
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