What a performance from Jayson Tatum!
The Boston Celtics star was in a scoring mood against the San Antonio Spurs, exploding for a career-high 60 points to lead his team to a 143-140 win in overtime after storming home from a 32-point deficit.
Tatum filled it up on an efficient scoring night, going 20-of-37 (54.1%) from the field, 5-of-7 from beyond the arc and 15-of-17 at the free-throw line — where he brought up his 60th point of the night.
🚨 JAYSON TATUM TIES THE @CELTICS RECORD WITH 60 POINTS! 🚨
— NBA (@NBA) May 1, 2021
The @celtics win in OT after trailing by 32! 🤯 pic.twitter.com/UXkbvOGdZo
Tatum scored 21 of his points in the fourth quarter and 10 in the overtime period, adding eight rebounds, five assists and zero turnovers, playing a game-high 45 minutes.
His shot chart is a work of art.
With the win, the Celtics keep their hopes of avoiding the Play-In seeds alive, improving to 34-30 on the season.
Let's take a look at some of the mind-boggling numbers behind Tatum's big night.
1: Tatum ties Larry Legend
Anytime you put yourself in the same sentence as Larry Bird, you're doing something right.
Tatum's 60 points tie Larry Bird for the most points ever scored by a Celtic in franchise history!
Bird, 28 at the time, scored 60 points all the way back in 1984-85 in a 126-115 win over the Atlanta Hawks on 22-of-36 from the floor, scoring 32 of his 60 over a 14-minute span in the second half.
0: Turnovers with 60 points
Despite playing 45 minutes and taking 37 shots, Tatum took care of the ball with aplomb, recording zero turnovers in the game.
His 60 points and zero turnovers make him just the third player in NBA history, with those numbers since turnovers were recorded in 1977-78, per Elias Sports , joining Klay Thompson and Carmelo Anthony.
Jayson Tatum (60 points, 0 turnovers) becomes the third player with 60+ PTS and 0 TOs since individual turnovers began being tracked (1977-78). @EliasSports
— NBA.com/Stats (@nbastats) May 1, 2021
The other two: Carmelo Anthony (62 PTS, 0 TOs on 01/24/2014) and Klay Thompson (60 PTS, 0 TOs on 12/05/2016). pic.twitter.com/mFUskhcREh
2: Second-youngest player ever with a 60-point game
It's hard to believe Jayson Tatum is just 23 years old.
The smooth Celtics scorer has already established himself as one of the NBA's purest scorers in just his fourth season in the NBA.
At 23 years and 234 days, Tatum becomes the second-youngest player in NBA history to score 60 points, behind Phoenix Suns star Devin Booker, who scored 70 points against the Celtics in 2017.
Jayson Tatum is the second youngest player in NBA history with a 60-point game.
— StatMuse (@statmuse) May 1, 2021
20y, 145d — Devin Booker
23y, 58d — Jayson Tatum
23y, 234d — Jerry West pic.twitter.com/c1l8gfFfxv
2: His 50-point games in 2020-21
On a night he tied a Larry Bird record, he set one of his own.
With 60 tonight, Tatum becomes the first player in Celtics history with multiple 50-point games in a season after scoring 52 against the Minnesota Timberwolves on April 9.
Just like tonight, the Celtics needed a monster performance in that game as they came back from a 17-point deficit to win in overtim. Tatum scored 35 in the second half and overtime to lead the Celtics to a 145-136 victory.
29: A comeback for the ages
At half-time the Celtics looked out of the game, trailing 77-48.
The 29-point half-time deficit marks the second-biggest half-time deficit a team has come back from in NBA history. The biggest being the Utah Jazz in 1996, who overcame a 35-point deficit (70-36), who came back to. beat the Denver Nuggets 107-103.
The Celtics trailed by as many as 32 points in this game, marking the biggest comeback of the 2020-21 season and the third-biggest comeback in the last 35 years.
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