NBA
Why Matt Damon and Casey Affleck love this year’s Celtics heading into NBA Finals
A pair of Boston movie stars are feeling good about the city’s NBA team.
Matt Damon and Casey Affleck are two of the world’s most famous Boston sports fans, and they’re especially bullish about the Celtics ahead of their NBA Finals showdown against the Dallas Mavericks.
For Damon, it starts with the Jays.
“Well, it’s impossible not to love (Jayson) Tatum and (Jaylen) Brown,” Damon said alongside Affleck in a sitdown interview with Olympic fencing medalist Miles Chamley-Watson for NBC.
Like Tatum and Brown, Damon and Affleck are a standout Boston tandem. The Oscar winners, who starred together in “Good Will Hunting,” “Ocean’s Eleven” and more, are reuniting on the silver screen for a new heist movie, “The Instigators,” which comes out Aug. 2.
Tatum and Brown’s talents aren’t the only thing that stand out to Damon and Affleck. The actors were also taken back by just how tall the Celtics’ All-Star forwards are.
“They’re so much bigger than they look on television because they’re all together on television,” Damon said. “But you go to a game and you go see them, and you’re like, ‘That man is tall.‘”
Affleck also spoke highly of Tatum as a person, calling him a “very nice guy.”
While Tatum and Brown are the stars, Damon believes the Celtics’ supporting cast can also help take the team over the top.
“They’re so deep, too. That’s the thing,” Damon said. “You say, ‘Which player do you like?’ We play all 12 of them, so that’s a huge advantage.”
“Matt’s flexing right now,” a laughing Affleck rebuttled.
Tatum, Brown and the rest of the Celtics will tip-off the NBA Finals at TD Garden at 8:30 p.m. ET on Thursday.