Atlanta trip aids grieving Brown
ATLANTA — As the schedule would have it, Jaylen Brown was in the position over the last two days to visit with the family of his late friend, Trevin Steede.
Steede, who the Celtics forward has called his best friend, died Wednesday night. After nearly deciding not to play in Thursday night’s win over the Warriors, Brown took the floor with a 22-point performance that was one of his finest as a Celtic.
He flew to his hometown separately from the team on Friday, and yesterday asked not to meet with the media. He spoke passionately about Steede after the win over Golden State.
“He came down on the first flight out of Boston. And he said it was good to spend time with family and friends,” said Celtics coach Brad Stevens, who surmised that the timing of this trip to Atlanta was beneficial for Brown, who went to high school with Steede.
“I think obviously it’s a lot of good things in being able to see family and friends but also probably tough,” said Stevens, who admittedly was impressed by the 21-year-old forward’s poise in the midst of this tragedy.
This was the second time in eight months the Celtics have had to deal with the death of someone close to a player. Isaiah Thomas forged ahead in the playoffs last April despite the death of his sister Chyna a night before the team’s first-round opener against Chicago.
Stevens, one of the first people to reach out to Thomas at the time, also played an important role in talking to Brown. The role of grief counselor has become a frequent part of the coach’s job.
“I just think that, unfortunately, life happens,” said Stevens. “We’re all human beings first and any time that you have a group of people that work together, that travel together, whatever the case may be, unfortunately bad things are going to happen. You just try to be as supportive as possible. I don’t know that, again, there’s any right or wrong thing other than everybody supports and anything that he needs, we’re there for.”
Also like Thomas, who responded with one of the most memorable playoff performances in recent memory by a Celtic, Brown took the floor against Golden State with remarkable poise.
“We talked a little bit before the game, obviously, and we said this last year, too, like there’s no right answer, there’s no right emotion, there’s no correct way to have to go about it,” said Stevens.
“There’s no right or wrong decision, right? To be able to, again, be on the court, spend time with your teammates, get a chance to compete, maybe it was a good distraction for him and certainly it was inspiring to a lot of people.”