Jaylen Brown led all Celtics players in points, rebounds, assists and blocks during Monday night’s matchup with the Detroit Pistons.
But after Boston was unable to secure a victory over the No. 1 team in the Eastern Conference, Brown pointed the finger at himself.
“We’ve got to be better. I’ve got to be better,” the Celtics star said after his team lost 112-105 at TD Garden. “I wasn’t good enough for my team, so that’s on me.”
Brown, who’s played his way into the NBA MVP conversation with a stellar start to the season, totaled 34 points, eight boards, seven assists and three blocks in a losing effort. He also collected four of the Celtics’ seven offensive rebounds and would have finished with a higher assist total had his team not shot 25.6% from 3-point range.
In the final five minutes, Brown hit a 3-pointer and blocked two shots to help Boston cut a nine-point deficit to two. But he also had a turnover, a shooting foul and, most consequentially, two missed free throws during that closing stretch.
“I’ve got to do better to get my team over the hump,” Brown said. “In my mind, I didn’t have my best game tonight, so that’s on me.”
Asked why he was critical of his performance, Brown pointed to poor execution on a few “mindset plays” that hurt the Celtics, “especially in the fourth quarter.”
“Staying down on the shot fake,” he said. “I had a turnover in the fourth and then just too many missed free throws. Just mentality-wise, mindset-wise, I needed to be more for my team. I wasn’t tonight.”
Foul shooting was Brown’s biggest issue in the loss. He misfired on half of his 14 attempts from the line, tying his single-game career high with seven missed free throws.
The two he missed with 2:01 remaining would have made it 106-104 Pistons. Instead, Cade Cunningham scored what proved to be the game-winning jumper on the ensuing possession.
“I think my team did enough,” Brown said. “I’ve got to be better down the stretch. We’ve got to be better down the stretch. (It was) definitely a game that got away from us, that got away from me. We’ll watch the film and be ready for the next one.”
Derrick White filled Brown’s scoring void late, providing all of the Celtics’ points in the final four-plus minutes of regulation and scoring 14 of his season-high 31 in the fourth quarter. But the veteran guard also committed a costly late-game error, losing possession with a minute remaining and Boston down four. He and Brown each had four turnovers in the game.
White voiced his support for Brown postgame, saying he was not to blame for the loss.
“I think that’s kind of what makes him special,” White said. “He had 30-something and still wants to do better for us, and so that’s what makes him special. He’s probably his toughest critic, and we know that he’s going to bounce back and continue to do special things for us. And so obviously, this loss isn’t on him, it’s on all of us, and we’ve got his back, but that’s just kind of the guy he is in this and why we love playing with him.”
Brown, Boston’s No. 1 option while Jayson Tatum recovers from Achilles surgery, has scored at least 30 points in eight of his last nine games. NBA.com’s latest MVP Ladder rankings, published last Friday, placed him fifth behind Nikola Jokic, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Luka Doncic and Cunningham.