Celtics vs. Warriors score, takeaways: Jaylen Brown, Al Horford lead Boston to

The Golden State Warriors entered the night undefeated on their home floor during the 2022 NBA playoffs and for three quarters it looked like they would continue that trend in Game 1 of their NBA Finals series against the Boston Celtics. However, things changed in a major way over the course of the final 12 minutes of action as the visitors walked into Chase Center and outscored the Warriors 40-16 during the fourth quarter to come away with a 120-108 win. 

The stars for both sides came to play as Stephen Curry led all scorers with a game-high 34 points while Andrew Wiggins, Klay Thompson and Jordan Poole combined for 44 points, nine rebounds and seven assists of their own. In the end, that was not enough to overcome the performance from Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown, Al Horford and Derrick White as the road team was able to steal home-court advantage in Game 1. 

Game 2 will take place on Sunday night in San Francisco. 

Here are four key takeaways from the game:

1. Celtics steal it with an incredible fourth quarter

The Celtics entered the fourth quarter in serious trouble down 12 points to a Warriors team that was 9-0 at home in the playoffs through the first three rounds. And when the frame started with Jayson Tatum missing two easy looks to continue his brutal shooting performance, it didn’t appear as though a comeback was in the cards.

That’s when Jaylen Brown took control. With Tatum struggling, the Celtics put the ball in his hands, and he started to make play after play. He either scored or assisted on 20 of the Celtics’ first 23 points of the fourth quarter, as they came storming back and finally tied the game with 5:40 remaining on a Derrick White 3-pointer that Brown assisted on. It would be hard to say enough about how important that stretch was from Brown. That was the exact scenario where they needed him to step up, and he did it in the biggest game of his career. 

It appeared as though we would be in for a frantic finish, but instead the Celtics just kept rolling right along. They outscored the Warriors 17-5 over the final 5:40 to pull away for a double-digit win and a 1-0 series lead. The final fourth-quarter tally was 40-16 in favor of the Celtics. That 24-point margin was the largest in a fourth-quarter in Finals history. 

While the Celtics played well in all aspects of the game in the final frame, the key factor was their 3-point shooting. They made their first seven attempts of the quarter from downtown and finished 9-of-11 in from deep the fourth. Even more impressive was that they had five different players make a 3-pointer during that stretch. 

“Just continue to play,” Al Horford said after the win. “That was our message throughout the whole game. They’re such a good team. And for us, it was just, you know, continue to play no matter what. And our guys, that’s what we did. It wasn’t our best game, but we continued to fight and find different ways to get this win.”

2. White does it again

When the Celtics traded Josh Richardson, a 2021 first-round pick and a 2028 first-round pick swap to acquire Derrick White from the San Antonio Spurs, there were some who worried that they gave up too much for a guy who…