Bostonglobe

The best has yet to come from the Jaylen Brown-Kristaps Porzingis bromance

S.Brown3 months ago

It remains up for passionate debate whether Jayson Tatum and Brown enhance each other’s games. But, delightfully, Porzingis appears to possess exactly the teammate DNA Brown needs to unlock his potential to develop into a more well-rounded and reliable player and playmaker. One considered worthy of his considerable paycheck. Feeding each other and feeding off each other, Brown and Porzingis provide exactly the type of non-Tatum, non-three-for-all offensive menu items required to redecorate the TD Garden rafters.

So much for the addition of Kristaps Porzingis cramping Jaylen Brown’s basketball style. False alarm there. It’s quite the contrary judging by the Celtics’ wire-to-wire win over their chief rival for Eastern Conference eminence, the Bucks, on Wednesday night.

This hyped matchup of hoops heavyweights with helium-filled expectations revolved around a newly minted duo — just not the one people expected. With their two-man game act, Brown and Porzingis upstaged Milwaukee’s ballyhooed one-two punch of Giannis Antetokounmpo and Damian Lillard in this ostensible Eastern Conference Finals appetizer at TD Garden.

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The two-man interaction between Brown (26 points) and Porzingis (21 points) isn’t on the pure basketball ESP level of Larry Bird and Bill Walton. But they produced an exquisite display of artistry and chemistry. It was especially noticeable in contrast to the lack of chemistry between Antetokounmpo and Lillard. They looked like they were playing separate games simultaneously, more dueling pianos than a melodious duet.

A sanguine 7-footer from Latvia and an unapologetically outspoken wing from Atlanta seem like an unlikely harmonious hoops pairing. But Brown and Porzingis have clicked on and off the court, sharing synergy on the court and laughs sitting next to each other on the team plane.

“It’s great,” said Brown, who bounced back from a pair of lackluster performances in Charlotte and Memphis. “We’re still early, only 15 games in. I think we’re still building chemistry and still just developing.

“I don’t know what it is; it’s just like an automatic connection. As soon as KP got here, it was just a connection automatically. I’m looking forward to getting better and growing.”

On a night when the Celtics’ offense barraged the Bucks, hitting 10 of their first 16 3-pointers and building a lead that bulged to 21 points in the first half, the highlight was salivating chemistry between JB and KP.

The piece de resistance on the parquet came in the first half. Porzingis took a pass from Payton Pritchard at the top of the 3-point line and whipped it behind the back to a cutting Brown. He then tossed an alley-oop to a cutting Porzingis for a monster slam that put the Celtics up 58-40.

It was part of a first half when Milwaukee couldn’t get out of the starting gate with Antetokounmpo missing eight of his first 10 shots. Meanwhile, the Celtics flexed their offensive might and put the game in a chokehold, leading, 67-53, at the half.

Brown and Porzingis made sweet music a few other times. Five of Brown’s eight assists on the night were to Porzingis.

“I absolutely love playing with JB,” said Porzingis, who tied Tatum (23 points) with seven fourth-quarter points to hold off a late Milwaukee surge.

“I think we’re starting to connect more and more, and it’s becoming just natural for us. I’m learning his game. I’m learning the situations he likes to be in, and, as you can see, we’re having some success with it. It’s really fun. It’s really fun to play with him, and I look forward to more of those plays.”

One of “those plays” was Porzingis’s only assist of the evening, a play deserving a chef’s kiss. It was a beautiful backdoor bounce pass to a cutting Brown, who punctuated it with a windmill dunk worthy of Dominque Wilkins that gave the Celtics an 82-68 lead with 7:08 left in the third quarter.

They led by as many as 20 in the fourth, which featured the only major blemish on the KP-JB act — a silly technical by Porzingis that gave the Bucks late life. It didn’t matter as the Celtics snapped Milwaukee’s five-game win streak in a game with a gap between the teams that wasn’t nearly as close as the 119-116 final score indicated.

The Celtics are going to be the Celtics. They’re going to bomb away from three. It’s simply the team’s and coach Joe Mazzulla’s philosophy. Mazzulla isn’t deviating. Love it or hate it, you have to live with it. Boston entered the night leading the league in 3-point attempts at 43.8 per game and took 42. They connected on 17 after starting 15 for 31.

The problem for the Celtics is that no one other than Golden State has ever won at a championship level playing this way. That’s where the development of Brown as more of a playmaker and off-ball scorer is crucial.

He looks more comfortable in those roles in tandem with Porzingis. Thus, it’s possible the Celtics didn’t just upgrade their roster by adding Porzingis and benefiting from Jrue Holiday getting rerouted from Portland in the deal that delivered Lillard to Milwaukee.

They’ve upgraded an existing key component by unlocking his game.

“Me and him in the action, you got to make a choice for sure,” said Brown. “The way he can shoot the ball is a threat; his athleticism and his height is a threat. It definitely accentuates my game a lot.”

The Celtics need other offensive avenues when the threes aren’t falling, and actions involving Brown and Porzingis help maximize both players — and ball movement.

“I thought tonight we got our effort back ... and I thought we got our connectivity back on the offensive end,” said Mazzulla. “The ball had a different type of energy tonight. We have to fight for that. I know it’s a long year, but the more we can do that and complement each other, the more dangerous we can be.”

Bingo.

Instead of Brown and Porzingis competing for shots, shine, and second place in the pecking order behind Tatum, they’re complementing each other.

They’re bonding on and off the court, and the magic moments they produced against Milwaukee in an early-season game of import were proof.

“We just click. That translates on the court. I think it’s only going to get better,” said Porzingis.

If it does, the Celtics are only going to be a better team.

Christopher L. Gasper is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at . Follow him and on Instagram .

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