Jayson Tatum is one of the NBA’s best and brightest stars. At just 24 years old, he’s a four-time NBA All-Star and won the Gold Medal at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo as part of Team USA.
But when it comes to his accomplishments off the court, the Boston Celtics forward-guard is pretty tight-lipped. Who’s Jayson Tatum’s girlfriend or wife? Does he even have one? Here’s our investigation into the basketball star’s love life.
Toriah Lachell, The Mother Of Jayson Tatum’s Son
If you’re a Jayson Tatum fan, you’ve probably seen his son Jayson Tatum Jr. (nicknamed Deuce), who’s become something of a staple at Celtics home games. The four-year-old frequently sits courtside to cheer on his dad and sometimes gets caught doing adorable things, such as falling asleep during his dad’s big dunks.
The fans love little Deuce, which has taken his proud pop by surprise. “I definitely did not expect it,” Tatum said of his son’s popularity in an interview with Boston.com. “It’s cool. He enjoys it. Every time he comes to a home game, people cheer when they see him and scream his name. When he comes to the games on the road and here at All-Star, he has his own personality.”
The mother of the adorable Deuce is Toriah Lachell, a hairdresser and owner of the Curl Bar hair salon in Boston. FanBuzz.com reports that Lachell and Tatum were high school sweethearts. The website claims that when Lachelle announced she was pregnant with Tatum’s child, she and Tatum were broken up, and Tatum was dating someone else. Deuce was born on December 6, 2017, just two months into Tatum’s first season with the NBA.
Lachell is still a prominent figure in Tatum’s life, but that doesn’t seem to have romantic undertones. Rather, the couple appears to have a healthy co-parenting relationship. Tatum loves being a young dad, telling ESPN, “if I am a role model for young fathers around the world, that’s great. I think we need more role models like that. Just to have more male fathers be present.”
Ella Mai, Jayson’s Current Girlfriend?
Tatum doesn’t talk much about his personal life, clearly preferring to keep his romantic relationships out of the spotlight. The only woman regularly featured on his social media accounts is his mother (sweet!), and the rest of his posts are either career-related or snapshots of his adorable son.
Still, he has been linked to several women over the years. When Lachell announced she was pregnant in 2017, Tatum was dating volleyball player and fellow Duke University student Samie Amos. Unverified rumors based on vague Instagram posts suggest Tatum and Amos split unamiably shortly after his son’s birth.
In 2020, Tatum was rumored to be dating British R&B singer Ella Mai. When the pair appeared to split in 2021, he went on to date model Bella B. Recent sightings of Ella Mai and Tatum at a star-studded Fourth of July party in 2022 suggest the couple recently rekindled their romance. (Though, she seems to follow Tatum’s suit in keeping her social media accounts noticeably void of couple pics.)
Either way, it’s clear that Tatum has his priorities straight: his son, Deuce, his career, and, if there’s time and energy to spare afterward, his love life.
