THE 2008 NBA FINALS THE BOSTON CELTICS
The 2006–07 Boston Celtics were, in a word, embarrassing. The once-storied franchise, the team that had won more championships than any other, ended the regular season with just twenty-four wins. While it wasn’t their worst record ever — ten years earlier they had won only fifteen — it was clear that if they were going to improve, changes needed to be made.
That’s just what Danny Ainge, a former Celtics player and the current general manager, did. He already had one of the most consistent players in the league, the six-foot-five small forward Paul Pierce. A nine-year Celtics veteran, Pierce thrived on group effort. To bring out his best, therefore, Ainge would have to get players who were equally dedicated to teamwork. Those players, he believed, were Ray Allen and Kevin Garnett.
Guard Ray Allen had been in the NBA since 1996, playing first for the Milwaukee Bucks and then for the Seattle SuperSonics. He was an accurate three-point shooter and a top-notch playmaker. In his eleven-year career, he had been to the playoffs three times as a Buck and once with Seattle, but each time he had left ringless.
Thirty-year-old Kevin Garnett had played forward for the Minnesota Timberwolves since 1995. He had helped them reach the postseason eight consecutive times, from 1997–2004. The Timberwolves had failed to reach the Finals, however, and after their 2004 run, they had fallen behind in the standings. Their 2006–07 record was their worst in years.
Tired of supporting close-but-not-quite teams, Garnett and Allen were ready to make changes. After some negotiations, both agreed to leave the Western Division to come east and play for the Boston Celtics.
Almost from the beginning, Pierce, Allen, and Garnett — the “Big Three,” as they were often called in memory of other famous Celtic trios — meshed like a finely tuned machine. Together with center Kendrick Perkins, point guard Rajon Rondo, and a strong supporting bench, they did what few people at the end of the last season thought possible for the Celtics. They won games — eight in a row, as a matter of fact, before dropping their first in mid-November!
That streak made basketball fans everywhere sit up and take notice. Were the Boston Celtics truly back, or were those wins just a fluke?
It was no fluke. In fact, according to some Celtics fans, it was a miracle. By the end of December, Boston had won 26 games and lost just 3. A month later, their record stood at 36–8. When the regular-season schedule concluded in April, the Celtics had won an unbelievable 66 games, while dropping only 12!
How much had Allen, Garnett, and Pierce contributed to those wins? A lot, as a glance at the game logs showed. Their names popped up over and over in the point-, assist-, and rebound-leader columns. Yet unlike so many star players, these three refused to put personal achievements ahead of their team. They even had a special word to describe their dedication to teamwork: ubuntu. Loosely translated from its Bantu origins, ubuntu means “I am, because we are.” In the context of sports, it means that a player is nothing without his team.
With ubuntu as their rallying cry, the Celtics made one of the greatest single-season turnarounds in NBA history. But now everyone wanted to know just one thing: would the team be able to sustain their momentum through the postseason, or would they collapse after having played so hard for so long?
First up in the playoffs was Altanta. It took the Celtics all seven games, but they finally clipped the Hawks’ wings to advance to the second round. There they faced the powerful Cleveland Cavaliers and their superstar player, LeBron James. Once again, it took seven games, but Boston sent the Cavs riding home to watch the rest of the season from the sidelines. The Celtics caught a one-game break in their next series against the Detroit Pistons, winning that round in just six games.
Now, at long last, they were back in the NBA Finals and on the verge of reclaiming the title last won by the Celtics in 1986. All that stood in their way was their archrivals — the Los Angeles Lakers.
Behind the firepower of Kobe Bryant, the Lakers had posted a regular-season record of 57 wins and 25 losses. They had swept the Denver Nuggets in the first round of the playoffs, beaten the Utah Jazz 4–2, and beaten the San Antonio Spurs 4–1.
In all, the Lakers had played fifteen games in the postseason. The Celtics, on the other hand, had played twenty. Many wondered how they would hold up against the more rested Lakers.
They held up just fine, it turned out. The two teams were neck and neck throughout the first match, trading the lead back and forth. Then, midway through the third quarter, Kobe Bryant hit a running jumper to give Los Angeles a four-point advantage.
Moments later, disaster struck for the Celtics. Kendrick Perkins collided with Paul Pierce. Pierce hit the ground hard and clutched his right knee in agony. Play stopped while his teammates helped him off the floor. He disappeared into the locker room, leaving fans and teammates to face the grim possibility that he might not return.
The game resumed. Boston had managed to take a one-point lead when, suddenly, Pierce reemerged. His knee was taped, and he had a slight limp — but otherwise, he seemed fine!
A roar went up throughout the arena. No doubt plenty of fans were thinking of another game when an injured star returned and inspired his teammates to play their hearts out. That player was Willis Reed, and while Pierce later said he would never compare himself to Reed, he nevertheless inspired his team, just as Reed had nearly forty years earlier. When the final horn sounded, the Celtics had the win, 98–88.
They won game two as well, although they very nearly blew it. Going into the last quarter, Boston had a seemingly insurmountable 24-point lead. But all at once, the Lakers, led by a determined Kobe Bryant, went on a scoring rampage. They chalked up 31 points to the Celtics’ 9!
With just twenty-two seconds left in the game, the score stood at 104–102. Then Paul Pierce drained two foul shots to make it 106–102. And when substitute forward James Posey hit two more, the Celtics had their second victory.
“We’re happy because we won,” Pierce told reporters after the game, “but we definitely learned a lesson.”
The Celtics weren’t happy after the following game, however—an 87–81 loss before crazed Los Angeles fans that saw Kobe Bryant hitting for 36 points.
Game four was nearly a duplicate of game two, only this time the Lakers were the ones who saw their huge 24-point advantage melt away before the Celtics’ heat. But where Boston had managed to hold on to their scant lead to win game two, Los Angeles had their lead overtaken in game four. End score: Boston 97, L.A. 91.
Boston needed just one more victory to win the championship. “Yeah,” Kevin Garnett replied when asked if he thought the title was close, “I can taste it.”
But the taste in the Celtics’ mouth turned bitter in game five. Once more, the Lakers surged into the lead, going up by 19 points at one time. Boston battled hard to recover, but this time Los Angeles stood firm and won 103–98.
The series returned to Boston for game six. The stands in the TD Banknorth Garden were packed. Among the spectators were former Celtics greats John Havlicek, Bob Cousy, and Bill Russell. In the rafters above their heads fluttered the banners they had helped win so many years ago. There were sixteen in all, and if the Celtics — already the winningest team in NBA history — could win this night, they would add one more.
But a win was far from certain. The score seesawed throughout the first sixteen minutes of the game. Then, four minutes into the second quarter, Los Angeles turned cold. They didn’t make a single shot for more than two minutes. Boston, on the other hand, drained eleven to go up 43–29.
Los Angeles woke up after that, but their efforts were too little and, in the end, too late. Boston broke their lead wide open, from 11 to 17 to 21 to 30 to 36 until finally, with just half a minute left to go in the game, they were ahead by 39 points!
The chant had long since begun: “Seven-TEEN! Seven-TEEN!” cried the fans as they stomped their feet in rhythm. Their cheers nearly drowned out the horn when the game clock ticked to zero. Final score: Boston 131, L.A. 92.
Paul Pierce, Ray Allen, Kevin Garnett, and the rest of the Celtics roared with glee. Garnett embraced his hero Bill Russell, saying, “I hope we made you proud.”
Russell, whose first Finals win had come decades earlier, just smiled and replied, “You sure did.”
Garnett had just one more thing to say before he hurried into the locker room. But he didn’t just say it, he yelled it: “That’s that!”
On October 28, 2008, the Boston Celtics played their 2008–09 season opener. Before the game, they raised their championship banner into the rafters. Paul Pierce wept openly, his pride at having achieved the ultimate basketball goal shining through his tears. “As a kid, I always dreamed of moments like this,” Pierce told the crowd. “I’ve had a dream come true to add another banner to the rafters.”