Jalen Brunson, Jayson Tatum history goes way back

 BOSTON

Of course they were going to meet again with everything on the line.

Jayson Tatum and Jalen Brunson  are the two most prolific scorers still playing in the NBA playoffs and the primary faces of their teams. All eyes were expected to be on both players as Brunson’s Knicks opened an Eastern Conference semifinal against Tatum’s Celtics at TD Garden on Monday night.

Though this is the highest-stakes meeting between the two superstars, it is far from the first. That one was 10 years ago in a 2015 high school showcase in Wheeling, West Virginia. A video of the game, in which the two stars totaled 87 points, went viral in the days leading up to the start of this series.

The video — which actually includes a Brunson dunk — is worth watching as it contains the seeds of the great players both have become. Tatum looks a head taller than anyone else on the court. Brunson wows the high school crowd with his fancy footwork and knocks down a jumper or two over Tatum.

Much has happened since that game between Brunson’s Stevenson High School (Lincolnshire, Illinois) and Tatum’s Chaminade Prep (St. Louis) more than a decade ago, but Brunson easily recalled the details from the game, including the fact that he spent some time guarding Tatum. Tatum scored 39 points in that game and Brunson erupted for 48.

“Yeah, but they won,” Brunson said Monday morning when reminded of that scoring battle.

And that’s what matters most to Brunson. The defending champion Celtics are heavily favored, so winning this series is a tall order for the Knicks. Can Brunson flip the script and make this series competitive? Can he take his game and his team to yet another level against a team led by Tatum, a player he has competed against for years?

Both have come up big in the playoffs, and containing them will be a prime focus of their teams’ stronger defenders. Brunson averaged 31.5 points, 8.2 assists and 4.0 rebounds in the first round as the Knicks ousted the Pistons in six games. Tatum averaged 31.3 points, 11.3 rebounds, 5.3 assists and 1.7 steals as Boston eliminated the Magic in five games.

Over the years, Tatum, 27, has won more often than not. A year younger than Brunson, he was a No. 3 overall draft pick by the Celtics in 2017 after spending one year at Duke. Brunson wasn’t picked until the second round by Dallas in 2018 after helping to lead Villanova to two national championships.

Tatum is a six-time All-Star, having first been selected in 2020-21. Brunson has been an All-Star two straight years.

10 years ago, Jalen Brunson played against Jason Tatum in high school. They combined for 87 points. pic.twitter.com/q6Z6yYcJzi

— Big Knick Energy (@BigKnickEnergy_) May 3, 2025

Tatum is 12-8 against Brunson in the pros. His Celtics won 61 games this year, 10 more than the Knicks. They also were 4-0 against the Knicks in the regular season, with the first three wins being blowouts.

Tatum’s Celtics have been to the Eastern Conference finals in four of the last five years. This marks the third straight year that Brunson’s Knicks have gotten to the second round, but the franchise hasn’t advanced to the East finals since 2000.

When Brunson and Tatum met in high school, the two had one significant thing in common, though Brunson was a year older and significantly shorter. Both were raised by fathers who played basketball professionally and were intimately involved in helping to mold their sons into elite basketball players.

The relationship between Jalen and Rick Brunson is well known to Knicks fans. An NBA journeyman who played three of his nine seasons with the Knicks, Rick is now an assistant coach with the Knicks and works his son out before every game. His most famous workout, however, is from a video in which the elder Brunson can be heard yelling “Tired is for the weak!” at a 10-year-old Jalen as he labors through a shooting drill in the hot sun.

Tatum’s father, Justin, played overseas in the Netherlands before returning to coach high school basketball in St. Louis. Tatum is close to his father now, but according to an article in People magazine, the elder Tatum pushed him so hard on the basketball court that Jayson said he felt “like I missed out on a father-son relationship.”

Both credit their hard-driving parents for getting them to where they are today, meeting again with everything on the line.