Jaylen Brown offers a challenge to Celtics fans: bring the energy for game seven on Sunday night
The Celtics did their part in Philadelphia on Thursday night. Now Jaylen Brown wants Boston fans to step up.
In the aftermath of a 95-86 victory over the Sixers in Game 6 that saved the Celtics' season and set up a winner-take-all Game 7 at TD Garden on Sunday, Brown directly called out his team's own fans.
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"Celtics fans, y'all love to call us out, right? So, I'm gonna call you guys out this time," Brown said during his postgame press conference. "The energy at the Garden has been OK at best all playoffs.
" ... I need you to come with the energy, because we're gonna need every bit of it. No excuses. We need everybody. So, I'm calling you guys out. Let's make sure the Garden is ready to go."
That's a bold statement from Brown, but it's not inaccurate. The Garden crowd was unusually quiet in the Celtics' dud of a Game 5 loss on Tuesday, and has yet to reach the peak decibel levels we saw during Boston's run to the 2022 NBA Finals.
Of course, Brown and his teammates are partly to blame for that lack of buzz; the Celtics have lost three of their last four playoff games at TD Garden and are just 1-2 against Philly at home in this series while coming out particularly flat at the start of games. But Brown is hoping the TD Garden crowd can help Boston regain its home court advantage Sunday.
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"When the Garden gets going, there's nothing like it," Brown added. "So, I'm expecting Game 7 to be a great basketball environment and I'm looking forward to seeing you guys there."
History will be on the Celtics' side; Boston is 21-5 all-time in home Game 7s and has won four of its last five Game 7s in its own gym, the most recent victory coming in Round 2 of the 2022 playoffs, when the C's rallied to beat the Milwaukee Bucks after stealing Game 6 on the road in similar fashion to Thursday night.
If the Celtics want to keep that trend going, however, they'll need to play much cleaner basketball than they did in Game 6, when they committed 17 turnovers and blew a 16-point lead before Jayson Tatum's heroics saved their season.
Tip-off time for Game 7 will be determined after Friday's Warriors-Lakers Game 6.
