Joe Mazzulla goes viral for trying to block Royce O'Neal's shot after a whistle

BOSTON -- There is no other coach in the NBA like Celtics head coach Joe Mazzulla. He is an absolute mad man, and a national audience got to see it Thursday night.

As the Celtics were on their way to blowing out the visiting Phoenix Suns at the TD Garden -- clinching a playoff spot in the process -- Mazzulla decided to play a little after-whistle defense. Following a thunderous dunk by Jaylen Brown after he picked off a pass from Phoenix's Grayson Allen, the Suns called a timeout. Suns forward Royce O'Neal got the ball and decided to take a 3-pointer after the whistle, as players tend to do.

But Mad Man Mazzulla wasn't having any of that. As O'Neal reared back to put up his shot, Mazzulla tried to reject the attempt. O'Neal's bid clanged off the rim, and Mazzulla's antics went viral.

Players trying to block each other's after-whistle attempts is nothing new. And Boston fans absolutely loved it whenever Kevin Garnett emphatically rejected any attempt by an opposing player, one of the many ways KG got inside the head of that evening's enemy.

But a head coach doing it? That's a new one, though this is not the first time the 6-foot-2 Mazzulla has channeled his inner-Garnett.

This is the first time cameras have caught it though, exposing the rest of the country to the coach's antics. But making sure no shot goes through the hoop is a mindset of the Celtics -- who possess the NBA's second-best defense -- and Mazzulla is just trying to live up to the standards he holds his players to.

"I saw a guy going in to try to get a shot and he hadn't made one. I didn't want him to feel good about himself going to the bench," Mazzulla explained after Boston's 127-111 victory. "Gary [Washburn of The Boston Globe] asked me about that a month ago and that's a bench rule. Guys don't shoot shots in front of our bench to go back to their bench to feel good about themselves. If I'm gonna ask the guys to contest, the staff's gotta do the same."

That is an interesting and unique approach from an interesting and unique man. 

"At the end of the day, it's about the mindset and the approach that we bring, and it's within the rules of the game," Mazzulla continued. "It's about setting a tone, and it's just that. One of the biggest pet peeves is thinking that a guy's gonna get a free shot and that's not the way it works. If we're gonna hold our team to a standard, we hold our staff to the same thing. There's been times where we've missed it and I've held the staff accountable to it, and we've gotta do the best job we can of not doing it."

Celtics star Jayson Tatum wasn't surprised to see his head coach go all out late in the blowout win.

"Joe being Joe," he said.  "That's who Joe is. When he did it, I wasn't caught off guard. I expect him or one of the coaches to do that. Gotta love Joe for Joe."

Mazzulla is a mad man, but at least he's our mad man.