LOS ANGELES -- On Friday afternoon, shortly before the Boston Celtics wrapped up one of their longest road trips of the season, Marcus Morris hadn’t seen his son Marcus Jr. in weeks, and Senior was feeling the absence acutely.

“I started blaming all my missed shots on not seeing my son,” Morris said, smiling a little. “It’s kind of funny.”

Morris has been trying to break out of a nightmarish shooting slump -- over the last four weeks with no Morris Jr. (except FaceTime, the saving grace for dads on the road), the Celtics played 11 games, in which Morris hit just 25 percent of his 3-pointers.

Marcus Jr.’s absence probably isn’t the only reason behind his father’s cold streak, but it certainly wasn’t helping. When the Celtics play at home, Morris often visits with his son during halftime in the tunnel instead of heading directly back to the court to get shots up.

“If I’m having a rough first half and mentally I’m in my own head, seeing him, it clears it up for me," Morris said. "It’s like, ‘Oh man, all right. Whatever it was, whatever I did, it’s not that bad.’ He definitely helps me clear my mind.”

There’s none of that on the road, and in the NBA, teams spend a lot of time away from home. Much is made of the stress jumping time zones can put on a player’s mind and body. But while teams charter flights and house players in some of the country’s nicest accommodations, time away from family -- especially away from young children -- adds emotional stress.

On the Celtics’ current stretch away from home, eight-month-old Marcus Jr., grew two teeth.

“S--- like that, I’m like, ‘Damn, I missed that,’” Morris said. “And you can’t get that time back. So I just enjoy all the time I get to spend with him. He’s just special to me.”

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Jayson Tatum went through his own struggles last season when his son Jayson Jr. (nicknamed Deuce) was born. Then a 19-year-old rookie, Tatum was trying to navigate his first NBA season in a new city. Aside from Kyrie Irving (who he asked for parenting advice) and the team’s doctor (who he asked for hospital recommendations), Tatum kept Deuce’s pending arrival a secret from everyone -- including Danny Ainge and Brad Stevens -- until two weeks before the due date.

“During the pre-draft in all honesty, I didn’t really know them,” Tatum said. “So if they didn’t draft me, I didn’t want to tell some people. Kind of wanted to keep it my business. They were kind of surprised.”

When they found out, however, the Celtics were thrilled for their rookie star.

“We were just telling him, ‘Hey man, this is exciting,'" Celtics assistant coach Micah Shrewsberry said. "'We kind of know what you’re going through as you’re getting up to this point, and then as a newborn, the things that are going to hit you, and the things that are going to come about.‘”

Several members of the Celtics coaching staff are fathers themselves, and for Shrewsberry, watching players interact with their kids brings him back.

“When (Tatum) is walking around doing stuff (with Deuce), and when they’re out here running around, it takes me back a little bit to when my guys were that age, rolling the balls to them," Shrewsberry said.

Now Deuce (who was nearly named Jaxon, until Tatum held him for the first time) often travels with Tatum’s mother, Brandy Cole. He was at all of the Celtics’ playoff games, and he joined the second-year forward on the West Coast road trip.

“Having my mom, that’s been very helpful for our situation,” Tatum said.

Cole was also the reason the Celtics knew Tatum (and Deuce) would be in good hands.

“He’s got great support, and like, to have the relief of knowing that his mom is unbelievable and she’s so great with Deuce, I think that let a lot of weight off his shoulders,” Shrewsberry said. “Like, ‘Man, I have my mom who can really help me, and she’s going to be unbelievable. Like, she raised me. So I know what he’s going to get.'"

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Travel can throw a wrench into the biggest occasions. Robert Williams had just finished shoot around with the Maine Red Claws and was about to grab lunch on the morning when his daughter Ava was born earlier this season.

“As soon as I got my food, (Ava’s mother) called me,” Williams said. “I was like, ‘Oh s---.’ I didn’t even have an appetite. I had to catch a flight."

Williams didn’t make it back in time for Ava’s birth, although his family was with Ava’s mother.

“When I got in the room, I just went and got her,” Williams said. “I thought I was going to cry, but I didn’t cry. I was just in shock, man, like damn. It’s a little raw. But it was a crazy feeling. I don’t think I started to really grasp it until days after, just watching her change slowly. That’s when it really hit me. I’m here, you here.”

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If the new fathers on the team hope the time away gets easier, Al Horford said they’re in for a rude awakening.

Horford welcomed a third child on July 11 -- his daughter Ava, who joins two-year-old daughter Alia and four-year-old son Ean. At this point, Ean understands what it means when his father says he is leaving for a few days.

“You have to be up front with them, and usually they don’t take it very well,” Horford said, chuckling.

To keep his son happy, Horford tells him exactly where he is going on each road trip -- facts his son can regurgitate later. Horford was talking to his wife earlier this season when his son piped up with the exact order of dates of Boston’s first West Coast road trip, nearly a month after the fact: Indiana, Denver, Phoenix, Utah and Portland.

“He remembers those things, and they’re important to him,” Horford said.

Fortunately for Horford (and others), the Celtics are good about allowing families to accompany the team on road trips. Ean recently joined his father on a trip to Atlanta, where he got to visit with his grandmother and see Horford’s old house. On the most recent road trip, several members of the coaching staff were able to bring their kids.

“Danny (Ainge) is the best with that -- allowing us to have our families (at the practice facility) when we’re at home, at home games, on the road when they can,” Shrewsberry said. “So that makes it easier. But it is hard, and there’s points where it’s like, man, you miss a lot of things.”

Shrewsberry’s 14-year-old son Braeden has had opportunities that would leave a lot of other teenagers envious, like sitting courtside at Staples Center and joining the Eastern Conference All-Star team last season for a breakfast event.

“It’s something they’ve kind of earned,” Shrewsberry said. “Dad misses out on this, but we get to experience this part of it when we are around and when we do get to do that stuff.”

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So what’s the payoff for all the travel, and all the time spent away from kids?

For starters, Deuce won’t have to experience the same struggles as Tatum -- or perhaps more accurately, as Cole, who had her son at 18 and managed to work her way through college anyway with little Tatum Sr. in tow.

“Just knowing how I grew up, the things I had to go through, knowing that my mom did everything to try to get me the best in life,” Tatum said. “Now that’s in my mind every day when I go to work.”

Ava Williams has given her father a new outlook.

“I feel like I look at s--- in a different perspective,” Williams said. “Not a reckless mindset I have, but ‘I’m the only thing on earth I’m worried about’ type of mindset. Before I even throw myself in bad situations anymore, I think about my daughter.”

Morris, meanwhile, is happy Marcus Jr. won’t grow up with the same struggles Senior endured. But he doesn’t want to shelter his son completely.

“I’m not going to allow him to grow up and not see that at all,” Morris said. “Like, where I’m from, I’m really from there. So the respect level, me being able to go back, me being able to really kick it with the dudes I grew up with is major for me. I think that guys in my position, they tend to sway away from where they grew up. For me, I like to be around that because I like to give the people there some more hope, if possible. To be from this area, to be from poverty and still make it out and be able to come back and still get that same respect. That’s big for me, to be able to take my child into the real ghetto and real poverty and show him what it is.”