How Jayson Tatum’s pick-and-roll will break the Knicks defense

One of the keys against the New York Knicks will be the Jayson Tatum pick-and-roll game. Over four games of the regular season, Tom Thibodeau’s teams couldn’t find an answer to it. The Celtics can run different plays with various options. Also, defenses can try numerous coverages and try to stop the offense from getting what they want.

Let’s first look into the different variations of the pick-and-roll built around Jayson Tatum, then we’ll deep dive into the possible defensive approaches.

Why it works?

The ultimate goal of basketball is to create a gap, an advantage that the best players can take advantage of. Teams are looking to create a two-on-one, three-on-two, four-on-three, or…