Young Jayson Tatum tweeted LeBron James for a follow. Now they meet in NBA East finals.

An old tweet by Celtics forward Jayson Tatum has resurfaced since Boston defeated Philadelphia, 114-112, on Wednesday, eliminating the 76ers from the NBA playoffs.

The former Duke star was 14 when he posted a photo of himself and LeBron James in 2012, asking James to follow him on Twitter.

On Sunday, the 20-year-old rookie will face the four-time league MVP as the Celtics meet the Cleveland Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference finals for the second straight year. The best-of-seven series starts Sunday at 3:30 p.m.

The tweet circulated last fall, about the time of Tatum’s first encounter with James and the Cavs.

Tatum told massive.com he was 9 or 10 at the time the photo was taken.

Helping make his case for a Twitter follow from James, the young Tatum referred to himself as the nephew of former NBA guard Larry Hughes – one of James’ teammates during his first term in Cleveland.

That plea, however, didn't work.

As of Thursday, James was following 181 people on Twitter – including Kyrie Irving, Chris Paul and Stephen Curry – but Tatum was not one of them.

When Tatum – the third overall pick in the 2017 draft – scored a career-high 28 points in the first game of the series with Philadelphia, he became the first Celtics player since Larry Bird to score 20 or more points in three straight playoff games, the team tweeted.

This story was originally published May 10, 2018 at 10:02 AM with the headline "Young Jayson Tatum tweeted LeBron James for a follow. Now they meet in NBA East finals.."