Boston Celtics star Jason Tatum scores 21 in fourth to beat Ja Morant and the Memphis Grizzlies.

Boston – When the Celtics guard Marcus Smart be seen Jason Tatum Moving forward the way the All-Star striker did in the fourth quarter Thursday night against the Memphis Grizzlies, he said his technique has become a simple one.

“Make sure I stay out of his bad way,” Smart said. “Let him do whatever he wants.”

Only the Smart and the Celtics did Thursday night, as Tatum’s 21 points in a 9-13 shot in the fourth quarter were enough for Grizzlies star Ja Morant to outrun 30 in a 10-for-15 second-half shot, lifting Boston to a 120-107 victory over Memphis here in TD Garden.

The win, Boston’s 13th in the last 15 games, and which put the Celtics in fifth place in the Eastern Conference standings, was one of the team’s best wins of the season. Not only did the Celtics (38-27) eliminate one of the league’s top teams in the Grizzlies (43-21), they also did. Jaylyn Brownwho sprained his ankle injured him in the opening moments of Tuesday’s victory here over the Atlanta Hawks.

It’s a victory that Boston achieved thanks to Tatum’s championships, as he went in the lead with Morant and came out on top.

“It was a lot of fun,” Tatum said of going back and forth with Morant. “The place was electric tonight. I think it was just one of those moments: two guys were going in, doing whatever they could to get their team to win, and it just so happened that it was a back and forth thing.”

Despite the seemingly silly highlight of the night – a one-handed finish in a quick break with Kyle Anderson – Morant got off to a slow start as he entered the first half with just eight points in a 3-for-14 shot. In the second half, things escalated quickly as he finished off those 30 points.

Morant did his best to get Memphis back into the game on his own one night when the Grizzlies struggled against the second-placed league defense. Despite this, Morant didn’t enjoy the fight the same way Tatum did—for one obvious reason.

he said no”. “I wanted to win.”

While Boston opened the game in the third quarter after taking a two-point lead in the first half, that was largely done with Tatum playing as a spectator. But that quickly changed in the fourth inning, when he advanced dramatically by attacking the edge, finishing 8 for 10 inside the arc. A lone hit three times in the quarter, which came in with 1:34 remaining to put Boston ahead 115-100, was a celebratory exclamation point for the late game’s rise that reflected the way the Celtics have turned their entire season over the past several weeks.

“I think, as a competitor, that’s what you’re looking forward to,” Tatum said. “Someone you respect like that, who does big things in the league, you just want to compete. The fourth quarter is the time to win the game, and I just wanted to play right. Sometimes it’s for yourself, and just try to get the job done.”

For Morant, Thursday’s game proved to be a teachable moment. Despite being a 6-foot-3 goalkeeper, Morant has been one of the league’s top in-house scorers this season thanks to his combination of agility, pace and speed. Boston was happy to back off and be forced to take shot after shot of the ocean. And early in the game, he and Desmond Benwho combined to go 4 for 21 in the first half, struggled hard.

The two started moving forward as the game progressed, going 9-14 from behind the 3-point arc in the second half, and Morant said that when teams try to force him to take jump shots, he’ll have one reaction to it.

“I’m shooting,” Morant said. “They come back, I shoot the ball. I put in a lot of work, you know, shooting from behind the arc. So the teams go back, you go down, I shoot the ball, I shoot it with great confidence, and the shots start falling.”

They began to fall again and again in the second half, as he tried to bring the Grizzlies back into the game. In the end, Tatum’s response was too much for Morant and the Grizzlies to answer.

“That’s what kicks in,” Morant said, if Memphis does anything wrong in defending Tatum. “We tried to make his shots as difficult as possible, but with such a special talent the guys find a way, pretty much.

“No disrespect, switch person, but same with me. I was shooting terribly at first, I saw some shots go off and shots started falling. Almost same with him. He went, got to where he’s comfortable on the ground and made some big shots for his team. To maintain the lead and come out with a win.

The win, which came on the same day Celtics head coach A.M. Odoka was named Middle East Coach of the Month for February, was the latest example of a brilliant mid-season changeover in Boston. After losing to the Atlanta Hawks on Jan. 28, the Celtics racked up 13 wins in 15 games, climbing to fifth in the East and in four games from the top-seeded Miami Heat.

And while there were plenty of reasons for the change – from Boston’s defensive improvement to possession Derek White To Udoka settling on a tight turn and the Celtics recovering — it also coincided with Tatum playing better, as Memphis saw Thursday night.

“I think watching us now, we’re playing with more passion and we seem to have more fun,” Tatum said. “Obviously when you win you tend to play with more enthusiasm and smiles and laughter and things like that. It wasn’t that often at the start of the season.

“This is basketball, after all, and it’s supposed to be a lot of fun. And we’ve had a lot of fun lately.”