The Boston Celtics just won the 2024 NBA Finals, but prior to that, their most recent championship came in 2008. While their whole team was stacked, a big reason they won was because of star power forward Kevin Garnett.
After being picked up in a trade with the Minnesota Timberwolves, Garnett arrived in Boston and immediately embraced their culture. A big part of that involved forming connections with former players, and one guy Garnett immediately connected with was Bill Walton.
Walton only spent two seasons with the Celtics, but he was crucial in helping them win the 1986 Finals, which was Boston’s last title before Garnett and company won it all in 2008. He and Garnett both wore the number five for the C’s, so they quickly bonded over that.
Boston is a sports city that is filled with pride, and both KG and ‘Big Red’ immediately embraced the town once they arrived. Garnett kept it real when discussing his connection to Walton, saying that he hopes the former big man is proud of what he accomplished.
“When I got to Boston, when they give you your jersey, in your locker, on the side of your locker, it shows you who wore the number before you,” Kevin said on The Ticket and The Truth. “(John) Bagley and Bill Walton was on my list for the number five. I think the Celtics do that so that you understand the responsibility of the number that you about to represent, for the people that actually repped it before you.”
“When I talked to Bill, that was our connection. He was asking me, ‘When you anchoring it, what you seeing?’…Then he would tell me how he would talk to (Bob Cousy), or what their language was, how they was talking, calling out picks and s***, and he was just giving me lip…So shout out to Bill Walton, representing the five, and I hope I made him proud for it,” Garnett added.
Making this an even more emotional revelation from Kevin is the fact that Bill tragically passed away back in May at 71 years old. The NBA as a whole was shocked by Walton’s passing, and it hit Celtics nation and Garnett quite hard.
For a team with as rich an NBA history as the C’s, it’s important to connect with players who used to play for the team because they know what it’s like to play in Boston. The fans are obsessed with winning, and if you, as a player, aren’t, you won’t last long there.
KG and ‘Big Red’ are two guys who understood the assignment. In a sense, Garnett helped pass some things along to this current iteration of the Celtics to help them win in 2024 in the same way that Walton once helped him.
Good things tend to happen when your franchise is more like a family. Even though they never played together, these two star big men had quite a relationship, and it’s clear that Kevin will miss Bill after his untimely passing.
