Jayson Tatum tallied the second triple-double of his season and fourth of his career on Thursday night, setting the tone for the Celtics in a runaway 124-104 win over the 76ers at Wells Fargo Center.
Tatum (15 points, 11 rebounds, 10 assists) was one of six Celtics in double figures in the victory and set the tone early with his passing, dishing out seven assists in the first half alone as Boston built a double-digit lead.
That pass-first mentality led to some unique praise from Joe Mazzulla, who credited Tatum’s evolving approach in accepting the fact that the Sixers were turning him into a passer with their defense.
“The honest answer is he’s been doing this a long time,” Mazzulla said.“People just take advantage of him and take it for granted, and it’s an easy way to use him as a headline when it’s going well,, and so he’s been doing this for years. But he’s obviously has continued to get better.
“Where I think he’s grown is I think he had I think he scored in the first stint. He came out the 5.5 minute mark and then he had two points and so he’s just not being defined by scoring. He has an understanding of being patient with the game and knowing how to manipulate the game and knowing when there’s spots to have the game come to him.”
The performance continued a stellar February for Tatum in which he’s averaging nearly 30 points per game while shooting 40 percent from 3-point range. He’s also averaging 7.2 rebounds and 5.8 assists per game in that stretch, leading to plenty of acknowledgement from his teammates as well.
“He was awesome,” Payton Pritchard said. “I told him after the game, this is one of your easiest triple-doubles. It just felt like it was in the flow. Obviously, he’s capable of getting 30 too but it was simple today, he got rebounds, assists and scored easily.
“Every year he makes a jump and adds some things. He’s still young obviously and that’s part of him growing. He’s going to continue to get better and better and we don’t know how far he will take him because he’s young, a hard worker and wants to be great.”
Tatum and the Celtics have now won four straight games heading into Sunday’s showdown against the Knicks at TD Garden.
