The Boston Celtics received their third loss of the season to the Atlanta Hawks on Tuesday night, 117-116, in the first NBA Cup game of the season at the TD Garden.

The big element in this game was the amount of turnovers the Celtics made, 20 total and 11 were from Jaylen Brown (6) and Jayson Tatum (5) combined.

At the end of the first quarter, four of the five starters all had one turnover. By halftime, Al Horford and Payton Pritchard added one more turnover each. Boston ended with seven at the half with an 11-point lead.

The Celtics made another seven turnovers in the third quarter alone, giving them 14 total at the start of the fourth quarter: Brown made three more, Tatum two, Derrick White, and Neemias Queta each had one.

The fourth quarter wasn’t much better for Boston. They made another six turnovers led by Brown, Tatum, and White, ending the game with 20 total.

Dusting his postgame press conference, Brown put the loss on himself and Tatum for the 11 combined turnovers. He said 20 turnovers is a sign of a team playing out of sync with each other.

There were certainly other factors of the game that led to Boston’s loss, like the lack of a rim protection allowing 68-points in the paint and surprisingly taking 25 less shots than Atlanta.

Brown is right, though: he and Tatum need to be better. They lead the team in turnovers this season- Brown (20), Tatum (37)- and although it’s not a league-high, it’s costing the Celtics games.

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Photo Credit: Brian Babineau, NBA Getty Images