Joe Mazzulla woke up on Tuesday morning an NBA champion. It has been a very long and unlikely success story rooted in faith.

Mazzulla — whose only head coaching experience before taking over the Boston Celtics in the fall of 2022 was at the NCAA Division II level — guided the team to a record 18th NBA championship after defeating the Dallas Mavericks in five games.

“There’s nothing better than representing the Celtics and being part of history,” Mazzulla said after Monday night’s 106-88 win to wrap up the series and lift the Celtics to its first title since 2008.

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But Mazzulla, 35, isn’t like any NBA head coach. Aside from being adored by his players, Mazzulla has found motivation and success thanks to his Catholic faith. In fact, he isn’t afraid to talk about his love of Jesus and family.

“He’s really himself. He’s like authentic to himself. We all appreciate that,” Celtics guard Payton Pritchard told The Associated Press. “He’s not trying to be somebody he’s not. So, I think that’s kind of like the sicko side of it. He’s different, but we respect that. Then the basketball genius, you can learn a lot from him as to how he sees the offensive side of things, the play calling, the game management, all that. He’s elite in that. I’ve personally learned a lot from him, and I think our whole group has.”

Mazzulla’s only previous experience as a head coach prior to his time with the Celtics was a two-year stint at Fairmont State in West Virginia, where he went 43-17 and made the NCAA Tournament in just his second season. A native of Rhode Island, Mazzulla played at West Virginia, served as an assistant coach for the Celtics’ G-League team before taking over at Fairmont State. He was hired by the Celtics again in June 2019 to be a member of the coaching staff.

Mazzulla caught a professional break on Sept. 22, 2022, just days before the start of training camp, when he was named interim head coach after Ime Udoka was suspended for the entire 2022–23 season due to violating team policies. His meteoric rise, however, culminated this season — after the interim tag was removed — and the Celtics went on a championship run.

“If we win the championship this year, we’re flying to Jerusalem and we’re walking from Jericho to Jerusalem,” Mazzulla told NBC Sports Boston last month. “And it will be kind of like just our reconnect. But we went last year and we stopped right along this mountain side of the Kidron Valley and you could see a path in between the mountains … the only way that [Jesus] could have gotten from Jericho to Jerusalem was through this valley. And right there I was like, ‘We have to walk that.’”

He added: “Most people go to Disney World or whatever but ... I think [the Holy Land is] the most important place to go back and recenter yourself.”

Mazzulla is of Italian descent on his father’s side (a former basketball player and coach) and African-American from his mother. Mazzulla and his wife, Camai, have a son named Emmanuel. He also has a stepson named Michael.

Growing up, Mazzulla played CYO basketball and later attended Bishop Hendricken High School, a Catholic school, where in 2018 he was inducted into the athletics hall of fame and called one of the best basketball players in the school’s history.

A few years ago, Mazzulla traveled to Jerusalem with the Rev. Marcel Taillon, a priest he met while in high school.

“It was life-changing — a very special journey to the Holy Land — and I know that trip really resonated with him, and in him, and even brought his faith life, and his Catholicity to a whole new level,” Jamal Gomes, the current athletic director and basketball coach at Bishop Hendricken High School, told The Providence Journal. “When you visit the tomb of Jesus and you walk where Jesus has walked, it grew and matured [Mazzulla’s] faith on that trip to the Holy Land. Many people say, if you ever make that trip, it’s an amazing and miraculous experience.”

Mazzulla, who often wears a small gold cross pinned to his shirt, hasn’t been shy to talk about Christianity with his friends, players and reporters. It’s those moments that have often put the spotlight on him.

Asked by a reporter earlier this month if he took pride in the fact that there were two Black coaches in the NBA Finals this year for the first time since 1975, Mazzula replied: “I wonder how many of those have been Christian coaches.”

In the NBC Boston docuseries, Mazzulla said prayer is a big part of his life and during his coaching and pre-game rituals at TD Garden, the Celtics’ home court.

“I like to do a prayer walk around the court at the Garden,” he said. “I like to be in the Garden when there’s not a lot of people there, just because it’s the Garden. So I get there at like 11-12, do a 20-minute walk around the court and just kind of take in how cold it is. I love that, the smell of it, just the banners obviously, taking all that in.”

Shown during his walk, Mazzulla was filmed holding a green and gold wooden rosary — one made from the original floor of the original Boston Garden.

“And so it just ties two of the three most important things in my life, [which] is the job that I have for the Celtics, my faith, and the tradition of the Celtics, it’s just a really cool gift,” he said.

Mazzulla, who turns 36 on June 30, said his faith is “the most important thing” — and also credited his players with coming through in the end.

“You get very few chances in life to be great and you get very few chances in life to carry on the ownership and the responsibility of what these banners are, and all the great people, all the great players that came here,” he said. “When you have few chances in life, you just have to take the bull by the horns and you’ve got to just own it. And our guys owned it.”

Clemente Lisi is the executive editor of Religion Unplugged. He previously served as deputy head of news at the New York Daily News and a longtime reporter at The New York Post. Follow him on X @ClementeLisi.