BOSTON — For a majority of the 2025-26 NBA season, Boston Celtics star Jaylen Brown has put the Green Team on his back. He rushed to do so again in the fourth quarter of a primetime showdown with the Minnesota Timberwolves on Sunday night, but even he admitted he was too hasty in the attempt to carry the Celtics.
When Brown subbed into the game with 7:30 remaining in the final frame, the Celtics trailed 87-81 and were starting to fade. The five-time All-Star tried to inject some life into his team by attacking the rim three different times in the last 12 minutes of play, yet none of his attempts were successful and the T-Wolves dominated the fourth to prevail 102-92 at TD Garden.
Jaylen Brown on what he could’ve done better tonight:
“Personally, I feel like sometimes when the game gets away from you a little bit, you’re going to be more aggressive, and sometimes you need to be more patient. So for me personally, I could have been more patient.” pic.twitter.com/1cwsOQGE3l
— Daniel Donabedian (@danield1214) March 23, 2026
“I feel like sometimes when the game gets away from you a little bit, you want to be more aggressive and sometimes you need to be more patient,” Brown said in a quiet locker room. “So for me personally, I could have been more patient on a lot of possessions.”
Brown finished with 0 points in the fourth quarter, as the Celtics were overwhelmed 26-15 in that final stretch while failing to hit a single 3-pointer.
“I don’t feel like I was as patient as I needed to be this game for my team,” Brown stated. “And I feel like that ultimately cost us.”
Although Brown struggled late, he wasn’t solely responsible for the loss. He led the Celtics with a game-high 29 points on a night when they had trouble generating any offense at all.
“(There’s) a lot of pressure, especially when we’re not making shots or the other team is playing a little bit harder than us,” Brown replied when asked if a poor rebounding performance put pressure on the Celtics. “Tonight wasn’t an example of what we’ve been doing all season.”
Boston was beat 56-53 on the boards and is now 9-14 this season when outrebounded by an opponent. And as far as shotmaking, the Celtics missed 24 of their 33 attempts from beyond the arc and converted on just 35.8% of their field goals.
“We didn’t play Celtics basketball tonight,” Brown said bluntly.
The Celtics didn’t just squander the game on their own, though. The Timberwolves, who were without star guard Anthony Edwards due to a knee injury, outplayed them in the fourth quarter and matched their effort.
25-6 RUNNNNN pic.twitter.com/AQ33IScqcM
— Minnesota Timberwolves (@Timberwolves) March 23, 2026
“Give credit to Minnesota,” Brown said. “They went smaller, they played faster, they got more physical, and they made shots — and that put pressure on us too.”
Part of those smaller lineups featured Timberwolves guards Ayo Dosunmu and Bones Hyland. The former sped by defenders and contributed 17 points, 8 rebounds, and 6 assists for his new team while the latter drained shots with confidence and taunted the Celtics en route to a 23-point performance. The pair also combined for 9 points in the fourth quarter, which was the same amount Boston’s entire starting lineup tallied.
“Fourth quarter, they got it rolling and we didn’t respond, we didn’t answer,” Brown said after the Celtics fell to 47-24. “So they just kept piling on.”
The good news for the Celtics is that this outing was largely an anomaly in comparison to their other 70 games. Brown has been better, they’ve been stronger on the glass, and their team defense went from a weakness to a strength. They’ll try to remember that going forward, especially with the reigning champion Oklahoma City Thunder coming to town on Wednesday night.
“Not a characteristic game of us,” Brown emphasized. “But we learn from it and move on.”
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This article originally appeared on Celtics Wire: Jaylen Brown admits Timberwolves outworked Celtics down the stretch
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