On this day in Boston Celtics history, the team won their 15th championship with a 111-102 victory over the Los Angeles Lakers in Game 7 of the 1984 NBA Finals, despite a push that got Los Angeles within three points late in the final frame.
Forward Cedric Maxwell led Boston with 24 points, 8 rebounds, and 8 assists, point guard Dennis Johnson added 22 points and 6 boards, forward Larry Bird 20 points, and 12 rebounds, and center Robert Parish 14 points and 16 rebounds. Shooting guard Danny Ainge and forward Kevin McHale chipped in 10 points each off the bench.
Bird would be named Finals Most Valuable Player of the eighth Finals meeting between the two teams, all of which had been won by Boston. It was also the first title the Celtics had won at home since 1966.
It is also the anniversary of the Celtics hiring Chris Ford as head coach in the summer of 1990.
Replacing Jimmy Rodgers in that role after Rodgers was sacked for a first-round exit against the New York Knicks the previous spring, Ford was elevated from an assistant to take his place.
He would be fired in May 1995 due to the team’s continued decline that was in truth mostly unrelated to his coaching abilities.
“We had all that stuff going on, there was talk of Chris getting fired (months ago), there were a lot of things going on among the players — it was tough,” related guard Dee Brown via the Hartford Courant’s Michael Arace. “(Ford) finally got the effort he was looking for (in the playoffs). He’s wanted all over the league right now.”
Ford would coach the Celtics for five seasons, amassing a 222-188 regular-season record and a 13-16 playoff record, good for .541 and .448 winning percentages respectively.
Today is also the day that Adolph Charles “Dutch” Hoefer left us in 1983. The Frankfurt native was born in Germany in 1921 and emigrated to the US early in life.
He played collegiate ball at Queens College of New York City and signed with the (now defunct) Toronto Huskies of the Basketball Association of America (BAA – a precursor league of the NBA) in the inaugural season of the league.
He’d soon be traded to Boston, where he’d finish his career in 42 games over two seasons with the Celtics, recording 5.3 points per game over that stretch before calling it quits for good — rest in peace.
Jim Seminoff also took leave of us for good on this date in 2001. The former USC wing saw his contract sold to the Celtics by the (also defunct) Chicago Stags in the season after Hoefer retired in 1948-49, and Boston was also the last stop of Seminoff’s NBA career.
He appeared in 123 games total for the Celtics, putting up 6.3 points and 2.6 assists per game.
Rest in peace.
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Story originally appeared on Celtics Wire