The Cleveland Cavaliers may have taken away the opportunity to play in the NBA Finals from the Boston Celtics’ Jayson Tatum, but he had a signature moment in Sunday’s game that no one can take away from him.

With less than seven minutes in the fourth quarter, Tatum drove down the lane and delivered a thunderous poster dunk in the face of LeBron James to the applause of the delirious Boston crowd.

In the heat of the fourth quarter with seemingly every Celtics player going on a cold spell, Tatum was sensational. He followed that up with a cold-blooded 3-pointer later, as the multi-talented rookie carried the team on his back with 24 points and seven rebounds.

Nevertheless, the Cavs prevailed with an 87-79 victory behind James, who had 35 points in the game.

In the postgame interview, Tatum spoke about James and how precious these moments were for him, competing against one of the players he admired as a young boy.

When asked about his moment in the game where he dunked on James and screamed and bumped the Cavaliers forward, Tatum explained his actions while also making it known that it was his version of a payback.

“Yeah, I mean I had to get him back for the two shots he hit on me in Cleveland,” Tatum said. “I mean no disrespect by it. You know, just in the moment, I made a play and was just showing emotion.”

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The two shots by James that Tatum was referring to were the two 3-pointers that James nailed in front of the rookie forward late in Game 6 to give the Cavs an insurmountable lead.

After the second 3-pointer, James yelled his satisfaction at the Quicken Loans Arena crowd, but appeared to bump into Tatum along the way.

Regardless of the game’s result, Tatum has nothing to be ashamed of, after he performed beyond expectations by being the best player on the floor at the very end. The Celtics were ravaged by injuries, the most damaging of which were the ones that sidelined Gordon Hayward and Kyrie Irving at different points in the season.

Thanks to Tatum’s emergence, the Celtics have a bright future ahead of them.