Boston Celtics' Jayson Tatum on Game 4 struggles - 'I got to be better'

BOSTON — Jayson Tatum had a simple solution for the Boston Celtics to bounce back with a win in Game 5 of the NBA Finals on Monday night — he just needs to play better.

«I mean, I give [the Golden State Warriors] credit,» Tatum said after Boston's 107-97 loss to Golden State in Game 4 at TD Garden on Friday night knotted the series at 2-2. «They're a great team. They're playing well. They got a game plan, things like that.

»But it's on me. I got to be better. I know I'm impacting the game in other ways, but I got to be more efficient, shoot the ball better, finish at the rim better.

«I take accountability for that.»

Tatum has not played to the standard he has set for himself in this series. He is shooting 34% from the field, and although he has passed the ball beautifully in Boston's two wins, compiling 22 assists and four turnovers, he has nine assists and 10 turnovers in their two losses.

Tatum, along with the rest of the Celtics, short-circuited in the fourth quarter Friday night, making just two shots over the final seven minutes. That allowed Golden State to close the game with a 21-6 run, flipping the outcome in its favor to even the series.

«We obviously felt like we put ourselves in the position to win the game,» said Tatum, who was 1-for-5 in the fourth quarter. «There's a lot of things we wish we would have done differently, especially on the offensive end. I think we just got way too stagnant late in the fourth from everybody.»

All of that, however, starts with Tatum, who earned MVP honors in the Eastern Conference finals and is the face of the Celtics franchise. He has been shown as the opposite number of Warriors star Stephen Curry throughout this series, but on the court Curry has been peerless.

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