Derrick White responds to Xavier Tillman’s “clutch” gene

ByNBAUSA



BOSTON — Even with Boston Celtics star Jayson Tatum indefinitelyThe Green Team has many sources of offense, from the 2024 NBA Finals MVP Jailen Brown on the shooter Derrick White. Yet when Wednesday night’s preseason game against the Toronto Raptors loomed, Boston was looking for an unlikely hero.

With just 1.4 seconds left in the fourth quarter, Celtics big man Xavier Tillman Sr. found the net over Raptors forward Jamison Bate to give Boston a 110-108 lead. On the other hand, Toronto couldn’t even get a shot off in time, allowing Boston to escape with a narrow victory in a game they led by 12 points with less than two minutes left.

Although White led all scorers with 33 points, the Celtics’ head coach Joe Mazzulla he did not put it in a time of crisis. Instead, he let some of his unproven guys face the test of a pressure-filled situation — and Tillman passed.

The 26-year-old scored all seven of his points in the fourth quarter, and his six rebounds were the most of any player on either team during the final frame. And while most of the TD Garden crowd wasn’t expecting Tillman’s welcome, White wasn’t surprised.

“That float is clutch,” he said with a smile. “He’s just very consistent day in and day out with his work, with his energy. And so, when things are going good, things are going bad, he kind of keeps the same demeanor. So when the game is on the line he’s really encouraging, he’s really upbeat, and when the ball got to him, he made a play for us.”

Why Derrick White wasn’t surprised by Xavier Tillman’s game-winner

The white smile revealed a lot, almost saying: You know, this isn’t the first time he’s done this.

At the end of the 2023-24 regular season, Tillman hit a similar game-winner in an early April game against the Sacramento Kings. There are many parallels between that shot and Tillman’s basket in the preseason finale, as both occurred in Boston, were 12-foot floaters, and came as the C’s were on the verge of blowing a double-digit lead in the fourth quarter.

Ironically, this was Boston’s only real winner during a dominant 64-win regular season. It wouldn’t be the last shot Tillman hit.

In Game 3 of the 2024 NBA Finals, the 6-foot-7 center stepped up and drained a 3-pointer from the corner to give the Celtics a 13-point lead over the Dallas Mavericks late in the third quarter. It’s worth noting that Tillman shot about 15% from deep during the regular season with the C’s, a timely triple-double in a monumental game where Boston needed all the points it could get even less likely.

The Celtics won the title in 2024, forever crowning Tillman as an NBA champion. Unfortunately, the next season did not have a storybook ending. The Michigan native battled knee issues and was never able to find his groove, averaging just seven minutes per game in the regular season and seeing the court for just one playoff appearance.

After some rest and off-season treatment, “X” is feeling more like himself. It showed on Wednesday.

“X did his stupid thing for this, so it’s great to see him getting rewarded for it,” White stated.





2025-10-16 21:55:00

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