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Jayson Tatum did not precisely say that the Denver Nuggets have been the one workforce that might have crushed the Boston Celtics final season, however, in an interview with The Boston Globe’s Gary Washburn, he mentioned he was stunned the Nuggets did not make it out of the Western Convention. And by the sound of it, when the Minnesota Timberwolves eradicated Denver within the second spherical of the playoffs, he wasn’t precisely upset.
From the Boston Globe:
“Folks all the time ask me, when did you guys know you have been going to win a championship?” Tatum mentioned. “When Minnesota beat Denver, I felt like Denver was the one workforce that they matched up finest with us. I assumed that we have been going to play Denver within the Finals and it was going to be an excellent one.
“However after we have been in Dallas and we went up, 3-0, oh my God. No one has ever come again from 0-3, so I bear in mind getting again to the locker room and I bear in mind saying, I do not know what recreation it may be, however we will win the championship. That was a bizarre feeling. I wasn’t capable of sleep that night time and I bear in mind the morning of Sport 4 we had shootaround, and I had by no means been within the place that if we win tonight, we’re champions. We have been at shootaround and everyone was making an attempt to behave regular. I could not take a nap. We misplaced by like 30. We needed to win so dangerous. We have been so anxious and so tight. However I knew after we have been coming again residence for Sport 5, we have been going to win.”
The Celtics misplaced each of their regular-season conferences towards the Nuggets. On Jan. 19 at TD Backyard, they entered the sport with a 20-0 document at residence, however Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray mixed for 69 factors on 29-for-43 taking pictures to make it 20-1. On March 7, regardless of 41 factors from Jaylen Brown, Boston got here up quick in Denver, with Jokic recording a 32-point triple-double. Each video games went right down to the wire, and so they each felt like Finals previews. They may have been, too, if the Nuggets hadn’t blown a 20-point lead within the second half of Sport 7 towards the Timberwolves.
Earlier than going 16-3 within the playoffs, Boston went 64-18 within the common season. No workforce got here near that document, nor to the Celtics’ plus-11.7 level differential. They’d a traditionally dominant season, and it is attainable that, had Denver crushed Minnesota after which crushed the Dallas Mavericks, it will have gone down in 5 video games within the Finals identical to Dallas did. For what it is value, then-Nuggets guard Kentavious Caldwell-Pope mentioned on Draymond Green’s podcast that they’d “no gasoline” within the playoffs and will have misplaced to the Los Angeles Lakers within the first spherical. Denver gained that sequence 4-1, however needed to overcome double-digit deficits in three of its wins. Murray made two game-winners towards the Lakers and scored 35 factors in Sport 7 towards Minnesota, however total wasn’t practically as environment friendly as normal within the playoffs (40.2% from the sphere, 31.5% from deep, 47.4% true taking pictures) whereas coping with accidents to each his calf and his elbow.
Denver, nonetheless, was the one workforce to comb its season sequence towards Boston. The Nuggets have been the defending champs on the time, and getting right into a battle of execution with a Jokic-led workforce is usually a scary proposition. If you happen to’re nonetheless questioning what would’ve occurred in the event that they’d made it to the Finals, you are not alone. By saying that he thought the matchup “was going to be an excellent one,” Tatum is underselling it. Main as much as the playoffs, this was the Finals that many needed to see. It had the potential to be an absolute basic.
