Witnessing the Celtics Rebuild As a Young Bostonian

The year was 1994. I was not even 8 yet at the time. The Boston Garden was still a proud home of athletes, and the city still drove through expressways that were not built underground or underwater. But a memory from then still reigns supreme for me.

It was my first time seeing the Celtics live.

The contradictions of the scene were apparent to me from the moment I arrived, all the way until the final horn. Ever since I began watching sports, I had been a Celtics fan, but my childhood as one was far different than the ones other generations of fans had. Larry Bird was on his way out right around the time I began tuning in. Kevin McHale also was in the process of ending his career, and Robert Parish, nothing in comparison to the "Big 3" version of him, was just a vet who was sticking around in my young mind.

The Celtics, instead of the banner-raising team my family grew up watching, was a collection of role players and borderline starters, like Dee Brown, Dino Radja, and Sherman Douglas. That 1993-94 season, the Celtics struggled to a 32-50 record, and missed the playoffs for the first time since 1978-79.

One could say that it was all downhill right from birth in 1986. The Celtics, riding high off a 16th world championship, also had the privilege of drafting second in the 1986 draft, and seemed ready to add yet another key cog into a team destined for yet another title run. Infamously, the Celtics picked Len Bias, who died of a cocaine overdose just hours after his name was read on draft night.

1986-87 came, without Len Bias in the mix, and helped set the stage for the upcoming two decades of disappointment for the Celtics. Despite having won eight of nine Finals series versus what many in Boston viewed as the cultural antithesis of their own city, Magic Johnson was able to burn the image of his series-winning skyhook into the minds of all Celtics fans. The slide continued, with the Celtics being eliminated in the next two seasons by the "Bad Boys" in Detroit.

Around this time, though, a promising young player, my first "Favorite Player", Reggie Lewis, started to make a name for himself. His local ties as a Northeastern University Husky also fostered this appreciation, and he helped keep the Celtics competitive despite an aging roster; eventually he would take over the team captaincy from Larry Bird.

Then came the 1993 1st round series versus the Charlotte Hornets. Reggie had averaged nearly 21 points a game in the regular season, and with home court, I was anxious to see if the Celtics would make a run. Then he collapsed in the first game, and the Hornets went on to win in four. Little did I know at the time how severe the cause was, and 3 months later, I found out just how bad it was when Lewis died of Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy during an off season practice.

With a second death in less than a decade of a young Celtics player, this time of their team captain, the Celtics struggled for the next four seasons, ending with a dismal, last place 15-67 record in the team's 1996-97 campaign.

But with that record came hope—a 36 percent chance of gaining the first pick in the draft and landing Wake Forest star Tim Duncan. Yet, instead of winning this lottery, the second of the primary antagonists for the Celtics of my generation appeared in the form of a Spurs team who tripped into the first pick—a pick they never would have received had David Robinson not missed the season.

Under the leadership of Tim Duncan, the Spurs would go on to win four titles in the time frame of 1999 to 2007. The Celtics, on the other hand, continued to struggle as an organization. The Celtics gained a little fortune in the 1998 draft, when possible top-three pick Paul Pierce dropped all the way to No. 10 for the Celtics to select.

1999 to 2007 proved to be a period of time impossible for any Celtic fan to escape, as the aforementioned tormentors, Los Angeles and San Antonio, would go on to win 7 of 9 NBA Championships. Every image of a bandwagon celebrity at a Laker game made me cringe, and every title Tim Duncan held high made me wonder what could have been. The Celtics, on the other hand, continued to provide a mere shell of their past incarnations. Even with this success in this time frame of the New England Patriots and Boston Red Sox, I still looked on every winter in disappointment as the Celtics register another first round exit in the playoffs, at best.

The 2006-07 season was my most miserable season to date as a Celtics fan. While happy that I could go to multiple games, it was more than obvious that the team was going nowhere. Paul Pierce was lost for much of the season due to injury, and the roster of young players and journeymen were only able to register a 24-58 record, the second worst in the NBA; the Celtics only finished ahead of the hapless Memphis Grizzlies. But with this disappointment brought on a similar situation to 1997. This time around in the lottery, the Celtics stood a solid shot of gaining one of the top two draft picks, and with Greg Oden and Kevin Durant available, it was all I wanted.

The draft lottery literally became to me what the NBA Finals were to the San Antonio Spurs. I watched eagerly in the hope of receiving a top-two draft pick, only to feel as dejected as sports had ever made me, outside of the 2003 ALCS, when I saw the Celtics draw the fifth overall selection. To myself and all Bostonians, it felt like yet another decade long death sentence for the team that defined our city's sports scene for 40 years. 

Then came draft night 2007. Unexpectedly to me, the Celtics had no intention of keeping their draft pick. This pick, Jeff Green, became involved in a trade package with Wally Szczerbiak and Delonte West for sharpshooter Ray Allen and their second-round pick, Glen Davis. Originally skeptical of the trade, I appreciated the effort by the front office, and that maybe the Celtics would have a base to build on for the short term.

Then the short term happened in a flash. Kevin Garnett, disgruntled by the climate in Minnesota, became the key part of one of the single best purges of all time, when he was sent to Boston in exchange for Al Jefferson, five journeyman players, and the Celtics' two first-round picks in 2009 (one of which was originally Minnesota's). With that, there was a base for something special, and for the first time ever, I felt the Celtics had a legitimate chance at being something special.

This "New Big Three" struck gold immediately, completely turning the franchise around in 1 year. By the end of the 2007-08 season, the Celtics had registered 66 wins, including winning records versus Detroit and Los Angeles, and seemed poised to run for the title.

While the young Hawks almost spoiled the season, the Celtics were able to get through it to meet the LeBron James-led Cleveland Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference semis. Like the first series versus Atlanta, the Celtics and Cavs went back and forth, winning at home and losing on the road, leading up to a Game Seven in Boston.

With this game came the first, as Celtics radio personality Sean Grande put it, "moment for my generation" as the Celtics, despite a phenomenal game by James, were able to hang on in a nail biter victory, and meet the Pistons in the Eastern Conference Finals.

During the Eastern Conference Finals, I went on a graduation trip to Florida, and made use of limited time to see as much of the Celtics as I could. From a random bar on Route 92 in Tampa, to an airport restaurant in Charlotte during a flight layover, I manufactured my viewing of the series. With it came the realization that Celtics fans all over, old and young, shared the same sense of excitement as I did as the Celtics steamed through the Pistons in six, setting up the media dream battle of a LA-Boston NBA Finals.

The Celtics, despite beating LA both times in the regular season and winning 66 games, seemed to be the underdog wherever I looked. From sports message boards suddenly filled with Laker fans, to ESPN.com polls, to the 9 of 10 NBA analysts who picked the Lakers to win the series, everyone seemed out to talk about how a team full of offensive talent like Los Angeles would overwhelm the often times unspectacular Celtics.

Game 1 started with immediate drama as Paul Pierce, early in the second half, went down in a heap. The thought of having to spend yet another offseason listening to arrogant Laker fans went through my mind as Pierce was put in a wheelchair and rushed into the locker room. Fortunately, this all proved to be an overreaction, as Pierce hopped out of the tunnel and took over, leading the Celtics to a comfortable Game One victory over the Lakers.

Game Four proved to be my favorite game of basketball ever played. Despite a 2-1 series lead, the Celtics looked overwhelmed and in trouble in Los Angeles. Pierce and Garnett had struggled in Game 3, and more importantly, the Lakers boasted an 18-point lead and looked destined to tie the series up.

Coming home from rugby practice tired out, I debated if the game was worth even turning on, and eventually decided that it was. What I saw after was a second half I will remember vividly for the rest of my life.

With the game seemingly lost by the third quarter, the Celtics went off on a 21-3 run that stunned the Laker crowd and turned the game into a 2 point nail biter by the end of the 3rd quarter. After playing the Lakers to a stalemate through most of the fourth, Eddie House made the hero shot with 4:07 left to give the Celtics an 84-83 lead. Suddenly, the inevitable loss turned into an air of inevitability in the Celtics favor, and the Celtics went on to a 97-91 victory.

Suddenly, my thought process changed from two decades of disappointment to the thought that I finally knew what it was like for prior generations of Celtics die-hards growing up.

Despite the Lakers being able to return the series to Boston in Game 5, the inevitable feeling of victory remained, and became a reality in a 131-92 Game 6 rout, giving the Celtics their first title since I was three months old. I finally saw the greatest franchise in basketball history back on top.

More importantly, I was finally able to look up at the rafters and see a banner for a team I witnessed. After two decades of disappointment and wondering, it felt fantastic.