Today in Boston Celtics history, the ball club hired their onetime star power forward Tommy Heinsohn as their next head coach. An alum of Holy Cross, Heinsohn had been picked up by the Celtics as a player in the 1956 NBA Draft, the Union City, New Jersey native played a total of nine seasons for the team, winning titles in eight of them, among too many other honors to list.
Heinsohn retired as a player in 1965 to do play-by-play broadcasting (he would return to this after coaching) and was hired as the team’s head coach four seasons later. He would lead the Celtics to an NBA-best 68-14 record in the 1972-73 season, garnering Coach of the Year honors. Heinsohn would win titles as a coach with Boston in 1974 and 1976 and was fired from the job after a disappointing 1977-78 season. He held a career 427-263 loss coaching record, good for a .619 winning record in the regular season, and won 47 postseason games while losing 33, a .588 playoff winning percentage.
Heinsohn was inducted as a coach into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame in 2015, one of only five people in the Hall as both player and coach after former teammate Bill Russell’s induction as a coach in 2021.
Birthdays
It is also the birthday of former Boston point guard Sherman Douglas. Born this day in 1966 in Washington, D.C., Douglas played collegiately at Syracuse before being drafted 28th overall by the Miami Heat in the 1989 NBA Draft. Douglas was traded to the team for Brian Shaw in 1992 and played parts of five seasons with the Celtics between then and 1995, when he would be traded to the Milwaukee Bucks for Todd Day and Alton Lister.
The D.C. native averaged 11.1 points, 2.2 rebounds, and 6.8 assists per game as a Celtic.
Bubble history
It was on this date in 2020 that the Celtics lost Game 1 of the 2020 Eastern Conference Finals against the Miami Heat in the Orlando Bubble, held at Disney’s Wide World of Sports complex due to an ongoing pandemic. The 117-114 loss was punctuated by a brutal rejection of Celtics star forward Jayson Tatum at the rim by Heat big man Bam Adebayo.
“Bam. That seals the game for us,” Butler said after the game via the AP. “I love how he does any and everything that you ask him to do. I really do.”
“You ask him to pass the ball, he does that. Score, he does that. Come up with a huge defensive stop, block, he does that. He’s a huge part to our winning. I’ve been saying it all year long, and I’ll repeat it again.”
Transactions
A year later, the Celtics traded Kris Dunn, Carsen Edwards, and draft assets for Memphis Grizzlies big man Juancho Hernangomez. The star of the Netflix “Hustle” film was not long for Boston, however, with the Madrid native playing just 18 games for the Celtics before he would be dealt to the San Antonio Spurs in a three-team deal. He averaged 1.1 points and 1.4 rebounds per game with the team.
It was also on this date that former Celtic center Wayne Embry was traded to the team from the (then) Cincinnati Royals (now, Sacramento Kings). Embry had retired from the game to focus on his soda distribution business but was talked out of remaining retired from the sport by Boston’s Bill Russell.
The Springfield, Ohio native won a title with the Celtics in 1968, playing two seasons for the team before being drafted by the Milwaukee Bucks in the 1968 NBA expansion draft held to populate that team and the Phoenix Suns. Embry put up 5.8 points and 4.1 rebounds per game as a Celtic.
Rest in Peace
Finally, it is also the date that we lost forward Phil Farbman in 1996. Born in Brooklyn, New York in 1924, Farbman played his college ball for City College of New York and joined the (then) Philadelphia Warriors (now, Golden State Warriors for 27 games of the 1948-49 season.
That January, his rights were dealt to the Celtics for cash, and he finished the season — his sole in the Basketball Association of America (BAA – a predecessor league of the NBA) — playing 21 games for Boston.
He averaged 3.4 points and just under a rebound per game over that stretch — rest in peace.