Jaylen Brown’s Finals MVP victory ended up being a bit more decisive than you might think.
The Boston Celtics officially won their 18th NBA championship on Monday night with a convincing 106-88 victory over the Dallas Mavericks in Game 5 of the NBA Finals. In the end, it was the Celtics forward Brown who walked away with the Finals MVP trophy, becoming the sixth player in Boston’s franchise history to win the award.
Jaylen Brown wins the Bill Russell Trophy as the 2024 #NBAFinals MVP! pic.twitter.com/ePINrAOdx4
— NBA (@NBA) June 18, 2024
The NBA revealed in the following hours just how close the vote was. Of 11 total media voting members, Brown ended up with seven Finals MVP votes while Celtics teammate Jayson Tatum earned four votes. Malika Andrews, Doris Burke, PJ Carlesimo, and Gary Washburn voted for Tatum while all the remaining votes went to Brown.
Take a look at the full results below.
Boston Celtics forward-guard Jaylen Brown received seven of the 11 votes for #NBAFinals MVP from a media panel covering the series. Celtics forward Jayson Tatum received the other four votes.
Complete voting results pic.twitter.com/i9g51gD10S
— NBA Communications (@NBAPR) June 18, 2024
It was a neck-and-neck race for Finals MVP between the Celtics’ two stars all series. Brown, who finished the Finals with 20.8 points, 5.4 rebounds, and 5.0 assists per game, took the early lead after the first three games with his energetic all-around play, his ability to take over in clutch moments, and his effective defense on Dallas superstar Luka Doncic. Meanwhile, Tatum who finished the Finals with 22.2 points, 7.8 rebounds, and 7.2 assists per game, was Boston’s primary playmaker offensively and had a monster 31-8-11 line during the Game 5 clincher. But Tatum was less consistent and slightly less efficient, which may have ultimately swung the vote in favor of Brown.
A 7-4 tally means that it was not just one swing vote that decided the Finals MVP race. With Brown now adding the Finals MVP trophy to his cabinet after also winning Eastern Conference Finals MVP during the previous series against the Indiana Pacers, that is a pretty nice haul for a guy who earned the biggest contract in league history this past offseason and was criticized by some as unworthy of it. As for Tatum, he made clear that he was not going to be bothered either way by the Finals MVP result. Tatum managed to have his moment in the sun too with some great viral scenes after the Celtics won it all.
