With just a few years of experience as a basketball head coach, Celtics Coach Joe Mazzulla led his team to win the 2024 NBA Championship. Throughout his career, Mazzulla has been outspoken about his faith and humble when receiving accolades. He chose a specific shirt to wear during all of his postgame interviews, which read, “But first…let me thank God.”
Joe Mazzulla Gives God the Glory As He Coaches the Boston Celtics to Victory
Throughout his short career in the NBA, Celtics Head Coach Joe Mazzulla has consistently been humble and direct, giving the credit for the team’s success to the team. When he was asked what he was willing to give himself credit for, he simply replied, “Staying out of the way.”
He then applauded the incredible players on the team who have nearly 20 years of experience. Mazzulla even recognized that players’ previous coaches played a role in bringing them to the championship. “It’s nothing more than just facilitating,” explained Mazzulla. “You have to allow the guys to set the temperature of the organization on a daily basis, and then you just have to facilitate and fill in the gaps from time to time.”
“He’s really himself. He’s like authentic to himself. We all appreciate that. He’s not trying to be somebody he’s not,” mentioned Celtics guard Payton Pritchard. “He’s different, but we respect that. Then the basketball genius, you can learn a lot from him as to how he sees the offensive side of things, the play calling, the game management.”
When Mazzulla sat down for a postgame interview with NBA TV, he quickly recognized he was interacting with some of the basketball greats. He told the interviewers he had “studied all your games, so I appreciate what you guys have done for the league.”
A player off-camera caught Mazzulla’s attention, interrupting the interview. Mazzulla shouted to the player, “I told you!” The player was later identified as Celtics small forward Jason Tatum. Tatum and Mazzulla have shared a special bond from the start.
Mazzulla shared a conversation he had with Tatum before the championship game.
“I told him, ‘Have faith.’ God put us here for a reason. We’ve all been through stuff. Obviously, the circumstances that we got the job under were not great,” said Mazzulla, referring to the dismissal of former head coach, Ime Udoka. Mazzulla was then hired as the Celtics’ new head coach.
Mazzulla continued to inspire Tatum, saying, “But you know, we are exactly where we’re supposed to be. And God always has us where we’re at. And you’ve just got to be patient, take your time, and use all the pain and all the stuff that you’ve been through in life for the next opportunity.”
“If you spend so much time worrying about that opportunity, and you miss the lessons that we learned from the past—we just had to stick together and use those things for that,” Mazzulla said, surmising what brought the team to this point. “I always told him, I said, ‘Listen, we might not win this year. But at the end of the day, are we heading to the process? Do we have our faith? Are we able to rely on that?'”
“That’s the most important thing,” he added.
“I grew up here, 45 minutes away, and I used to come to the games,” Mazzulla said. “I’m just grateful for the ownership, the responsibility, and everything that comes with this team.”
