A trip to the conference finals in 2002 started a run of four straight playoff years for the Celtics during an otherwise dry period of professional basketball in Boston. But the Celts had been progressively moving backward—a second-round loss in 2003, and then first-round exits in 2004 and 2005. The 2006 Boston Celtics continued the […]
The Boston Celtics were the winners of four straight Eastern Conference titles. Two of those, 1984 and 1986, ended in NBA championships. But you could see the end starting to come. The road back to the Finals in 1987 had been the hardest journey yet. The Detroit Pistons were coming on strong in the East. […]
The Boston Celtics were riding high in the summer of 1986. They had just won a championship, producing one of the greatest NBA teams of all-time in the process. Thanks to farsighted management by Red Auerbach they had the second overall pick in the draft. They used to get it Len Bias, an immensely talented […]
Larry Bird had already led the Celtics to a pair of NBA championships, winning in 1981 and 1984. The 1985 Boston Celtics made a strong bid at a repeat title and looked poised to do it, when everything came undone at the hands of their archrival. READ GREAT 1980s SPORTS MOMENTS Bird was at the […]
Larry Bird arrived in Boston in 1980 when the Celtics were staggering after two bad years. Bird immediately produced three consecutive trips to the conference finals, including a 1981 NBA title run. The 1983 Boston Celtics spent the season looking like a title contender, but came up drastically short in the playoffs. READ GREAT 1980s […]
A new era arrived in Boston in 1980 with the arrival of Larry Bird and the championship run of 1981 gave Larry Legend quick validation. The 1982 Boston Celtics were an outstanding team that was poised to repeat—right down to vanquishing a rival in the exact same manner as ’81—before coming up just short. READ […]
Larry Bird had been gamely fighting his declining body for four seasons and the 1992 Boston Celtics campaign would be his last run. The Celtics were no longer in the NBA’s upper crust, but they remained a competitive team and made sure Bird’s final season was a good one. GREAT 1980s SPORTS MOMENTS Start reading today. […]
The 1990 Boston Celtics entered the season in territory the franchise hadn’t experienced since the late 1970s—rebuilding mode. Larry Bird missed almost the entire 1989 season due to the back problems that would ultimately end his career a few years later and the Celtics barely made the playoffs. The 1990 team saw the trajectory move […]
The 1986 Boston Celtics were the third and last of the championship teams led by Larry Bird. They were also by far the best. The Celtics drive to a third NBA title in six years was so overwhelming it seemed almost a foregone conclusion much of the way.
The 1980 Boston Celtics were the team the franchise’s great fan base had been waiting for. The team, the NBA’s standard-bearer from 1957-76 when they won fourteen championships, had gone through two miserable years, at 32-50 and 29-53. But in the 1978 NBA draft, team president Red Auerbach made the far-sighted decision to draft Larry […]
The 1984 Boston Celtics won an NBA championship that filled in an important line on Larry Bird’s resume. Five years earlier, as a college senior at Indiana State, Bird lost the NCAA final to Magic Johnson and Michigan State. Even though Bird won an NBA crown in 1981 it came against a sub-.500 Houston Rockets team. […]
Officially, the Larry Bird era in Boston started in 1980, when the Legend arrived from Indiana State for his rookie year. But practically speaking, it was the 1981 Boston Celtics that ushered in this glorious new era for the proud franchise. Specially, six days and three games in the Eastern Conference Finals that paved the […]