Jaylen Brown shines early, late as Celtics hold off Timberwolves

BOSTON — It’s a shame the Celtics and Minnesota Timberwolves play each other just twice per season. Lately, whenever Boston and Minnesota square off, drama ensues.

Sunday’s matchup at TD Garden was no different, with the Celtics surviving a furious Wolves comeback to win 107-105.

Jaylen Brown’s 3-pointer with 76 seconds remaining proved to be the difference, capping a 29-point performance that also included Boston’s first 15 points of the game. Naz Reid had a chance to win it for Minnesota as time expired, but his three both missed the mark and did not leave his hand before the final buzzer.

Jayson Tatum added 26 points, eight rebounds, four assists and two steals for Boston, which won its fifth straight to improve to 14-3. Derrick White finished with 19 points, nine rebounds, five assists, two blocks and a steal. Brown, Tatum and White combined to shoot 16 for 31 (51.6%) from 3-point range in the win.

Anthony Edwards and Julius Randle scored 28 and 23 points, respectively, to lead the Timberwolves, who have not won in Boston since 2005. Rudy Gobert grabbed 20 rebounds — the most by a Celtics opponent this season — including eight offensive boards.

Both Celtics-Wolves meetings last season went to overtime.

“They test you every possession on both ends of the floor with their physicality, their rim protection, their ball pressure, and they’ve got dynamic guys that could score at any time,” Celtics head coach Joe Mazzulla said. “So you’re going to go through runs. It’s just a matter of how you handle them. I thought our guys handled it well with the physicality on offense and our connectivity, our poise defensively.”

Brown got off to a scorching start for the Celtics, drilling five 3-pointers on five shots in the first 3:14 of game time. The NBA Finals MVP hadn’t hit five threes in any full game since Boston’s season opener, and he reached that mark just four times all last season.

With Brown’s hand hot, Mazzulla deviated from his typical early-game plan, giving Tatum a rest after eight minutes and playing Brown for the entire first quarter. Those roles have been flipped in most games this season, with Tatum playing the full opening frame in all but one contest before Sunday.

“It’s just a credit to their flexibility,” Mazzulla said. “You’re able to go to different lineups, do different things. For the most part, we try to keep the consistency, but at the end of the day, you’ve just got to be malleable and just take on what the game calls for. They both do a great job of kind of being flexible in that.”

Brown’s 5 for 5 start represented nearly all of Boston’s first-quarter offense, however. The team made just three of its other 18 field goal attempts, and it took more than nine minutes for any other Celtics player to record a point. Minnesota led 27-24 after one.

Tatum, held scoreless in the first, fueled Boston in the second quarter with 13 points on seven shots, including a second-chance 3-pointer off a Sam Hauser offensive rebound and a tough driving layup over reigning NBA Defensive Player of the Year Gobert. Al Horford also sank two 3s in the quarter as the Celtics built a 10-point lead.

But the Wolves scored the final nine points of the half, routinely exploiting one of the Celtics’ biggest weaknesses so far this season: rim protection. Minnesota went 11 for 13 inside the restricted area in the first half (and 10 for 36 on all other shots) and trailed 55-52 at halftime.

That interior success kept the Wolves competitive for a half. But the Celtics’ 3-point barrage eventually became too much for the underdog visitors to handle.

Boston made six threes in the first 6 1/2 minutes of the third quarter — three by Tatum; one each by Brown, Horford and Jrue Holiday — to open up a 19-point lead. The Celtics also blocked five Timberwolves shots in the quarter, including two rejections by White.

Another of those came courtesy of Xavier Tillman, who saw his largest workload in weeks as Mazzulla shook up his frontcourt rotation. With Luke Kornet (hamstring tightness) inactive, Mazzulla used Tillman as Horford’s top backup rather than the struggling Neemias Queta.

Tillman played 14 minutes, finishing with three points, four rebounds and one block. Queta, who came in averaging 22.5 minutes per game in November, was a healthy DNP for the first time since Oct. 26.

Mazzulla said he went with Tillman because of the switching ability he provides.

“It’s a credit to him,” the coach said. “Luke was out, but Neemi and those guys, we just have to take take advantage of the versatility that our bench provides versus different matchups and have to be able to go to different stuff. So it’s key that those guys constantly stay ready and they all got to play their part. They do a good job of that.”

The Celtics carried an 84-73 lead into the fourth quarter, then had to fend off a late Timberwolves charge led by backup guard Rob Dillingham, who hit two threes and a layup to help Minnesota close the gap. Edwards added two threes of his own after checking back in for Dillingham, and Jaden McDaniels’ driving baseline dunk with 2:04 remaining cut Boston’s lead to 104-102.

But Brown’s three on the ensuing Celtics possession proved to be the game-winner, though he missed another shortly thereafter that could have iced the game. A Randle layup got Minnesota within two, but Reid couldn’t convert his would-be buzzer-beater out of a Wolves timeout.

The Celtics will be back at TD Garden on Monday night, when they’ll host the Los Angeles Clippers for the second game of a back-to-back.

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