ESPN reported on Tuesday that the Latvian centre will take "a few months" to get back on the court, according to the player, who came off the bench and played 16 minutes during Game 5 of the NBA Finals, which Boston won 106-88 over the Dallas Mavericks. The big man has been a key factor for the team that posted the best record during the regular season and eventually lifted the Larry O-Brien trophy on Monday, but he had also been nursing a connective tissue tear and ligament displacement near his left ankle since Game 2 of the series, missing games 3 and 4.

While his home country of Latvia cheered on his accomplishments abroad, his physical unavailability is terrible news for its national basketball team, who included him among the players in the extended roster for the FIBA Olympic Qualifying Tournament in Riga, which is scheduled to start on 2 July and lasts five days, and was hoping that he would be able to compete at the upcoming Summer Games.

In a press release, the Celtics had described his injury as "rare", having suffered "a torn medial retinaculum allowing dislocation of the posterior tibialis tendon." The big man posted averages of 20.1 points, 7.2 rebounds, 2.0 assists, and 1.9 blocks per game in 57 appearances during the regular season. His statistics dipped noticeably in the playoffs, as he averaged 12.3 points, 4.4 rebounds, 1.1 assists, and 1.6 blocks per game, but his presence was still felt in the finals against Dallas, especially in the first two games in Boston, where he had become a crowd favourite.

"A lot of effort went into all of this and also for myself, just being hurt and trying to push through it," an ecstatic Porzingis said from the winning locker room after notching his first NBA championship.  "I think today was the pinnacle of that. My leg is not great, but I gave everything I could to the team and we are the world champs."

The 7-foot-2 Latvian, who played for the Mavericks from 2019 to 2022, has been injury-prone since being selected fourth overall in the 2015 Draft by the New York Knicks. He played sparingly during this season’s Playoffs after straining his calf in Game 4 of the Celtics' first-round series against the Miami Heat, but made it count when he stepped on the floor against his former team in the finals. He scored five points on Monday, provided rim protection in key moments and got the crowd going, despite being absent in the previous game, which the Celtics lost in Dallas.

“I think something could have happened, for sure, especially compensating now on the other leg. … There was definitely some added risk, but I didn’t care,” Porzingis told ESPN. “I was like, ‘I want to give everything I can and then fix it after if I need to.'”

Porzingis debuted on the senior Latvian national team at EuroBasket 2017, where he averaged 23.6 points per game before falling to eventual champion Slovenia in the quarter-finals. After a five-year absence, he returned to play in the 2023 European Qualifiers and averaged 25.5 points, 14 rebounds and three blocked shots per game.

Training camp for the Latvia national team started on Monday, with all eyes set on the July tournament, in which two teams from each group will advance to the semifinal stage; yet only the winners of each FIBA Olympic Qualifiers will seal their ticket to Paris 2024.