Jayson Tatum rolled his ankle on the first play of Game 7 of the Eastern Conference Finals against the Heat and it affected how he played the whole game.
The 25-year-old forward finished the game with just 14 points (5/13 field goals, 1/4 three-pointers) as Boston lost convincingly (84-103).
His teammate Marcus Smart thought that the ankle injury had a serious effect on Tatum’s ability to play in the crucial game of the series.
“He took a fall early. He hurt his ankle really bad early,” Smart said postgame. “He could have came out of the game. He stayed and he tried to fight. Obviously, you can see he wasn’t himself. He wasn’t as explosive and the ankle was really killing him. He tried to fight. It just didn’t go in his favor. It didn’t go into any of our favors.
“But we continue just to fight and help him and try to get through. Then D-White goes out with a knee injury as well. And then obviously we know about Malcolm. So it’s tough. At the wrong time. But it’s part of the game. Like I said, certain things you can’t control. Getting hurt like that is nothing you can control. So it just happened at the wrong time.”
