John Tonje has had a whirlwind couple of months.
The 24-year-old guard was traded from the Utah Jazz to the Celtics in the trade that sent Chris Boucher to Utah, and quickly became the Celtics’ third two-way player.
Tonje has split his time between the Maine Celtics and the Boston Celtics so far, and made his NBA debut on February 24th. Just a few days later, he scored his first NBA points in a game against the Brooklyn Nets at TD Garden.
“It all happened fast, it kind of caught me by surprise,” Tonje
told CelticsBlog last month. “But I’m blessed to be in this position.”
On Tuesday night, Tonje recorded his best G League game yet. He exploded for 42 points on 12 of 20 shooting and sank 8 of his 10 three-point attempts. In turn, the Maine Celtics beat the Osceola Magic 119-112 to improve to 14-16 on the season. The Magic currently has the best G League record in the Eastern Conference, at 19-8.
John Tonje’s rookie campaign continues with the Celtics
Before the trade, John Tonje appeared in 32 games for the Jazz’s G League affiliate this season, the Salt Lake City Stars, averaging 18 points, 4.1 rebounds, and 1.4 assists per game.
That came on the heels of an NCAA Tournament run with the Wisconsin Badgers, in which he averaged 19.6 points and 5.3 rebounds per game. Before Wisconsin, he spent four seasons at Colorado State and one year in Missouri.
A fun tidbit about Tonje is that he was high school AAU teammates with Baylor Scheierman in Nebraska, almost a decade ago.
And, Scheierman remembers him as a prolific scorer.
“He can score in a variety of ways,” he said. “He’s a good defender. I think those are the two biggest things that stood out to me back in those days. I was a completely different player and build back in those days, but I think those are the two things that stuck out the most, was just his physical maturity, it was just the ability to score.”
After being drafted 53rd overall by the Jazz back in June, Tonje assumed he’d be in Utah at least for a bit. But he landed in Boston, not even a full season into his NBA career.
And, the Celtics already feel different.
“I think it’s the culture — just the way that everyone is bought in there’s a little bit of aura, for lack of a better term, on the team,” he said.
For now, Tonje is getting up to speed with the Maine Celtics.
But, he’s also spent plenty of time with the parent club, joining the Celtics for their West Coast road trip last month on a 10 Day contract.
“Everyone’s been super welcoming, and Joe is super humble, so it’s been great,” he said. “Just kind of learning from him. And, knowing some of these guys from afar — getting a chance to meet them and be around them has been awesome.”
