In the NBA Finals, you could argue that this is a Golden State Warriors vs. Boston Celtics series. The Warriors have three rings and are looking to make it four in five years but they owe their success to some early-80s magic from Bill Russell’s Celtics team.
The “golden state warriors trade history” is a series of trades that the Boston Celtics made during their time as an ’80s dynasty. The trades helped the Celtics become one of the best teams in NBA history, but it also led to some bad luck and a lack of championship banners at TD Garden.
The Boston Celtics and the Golden State Warriors don’t play each other very frequently. Normally, the two teams only meet twice a year, but they will see each other quite a bit in the coming weeks. The Boston Celtics defeated the Miami Heat in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference Finals on Sunday, advancing to the NBA Finals to face Stephen Curry and the Warriors.
The clubs had previously played in the playoffs in 1964, when Golden State was known as the San Francisco Warriors. They also met before to the NBA Draft in 1980. It was off the court, and the two sides agreed to an agreement that would help transform the Celtics’ future and add a few more banners to the rafters.
To get to the NBA Finals, the Boston Celtics and Golden State Warriors followed different routes.
On March 16, 2022, in San Francisco, California, Klay Thompson of the Golden State Warriors draws up to shoot the ball in the second quarter against Jaylen Brown of the Boston Celtics at Chase Center. | Getty Images/Lachlan Cunningham .
On Sunday, the Boston Celtics completed a remarkable comeback by defeating the Miami Heat in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference Finals. The Celtics’ postseason chances, much alone a trip in the NBA Finals, were in doubt halfway through the 2021-22 season.
The Celtics were a complete disaster. The norm was inconsistency. They seemed to be the greatest team in the NBA at times, but then would lose a 20-point lead in the same game.
Frustration increased. Early in the season, Marcus Smart chastised Boston’s key players. During the early part of the season, first-year coach Ime Udoka questioned his team’s effort on multiple occasions. The Celtics weren’t even certain to make the playoffs more than halfway through the season. They were 25-25 after 50 games.
When January arrived, the Celtics did as well. They began to put the pieces together. Before All-Star Weekend, Boston had a nine-game winning streak and concluded the regular season with a 26-6 record.
The Warriors, on the other hand, were the polar opposite. They stormed off to an 18-2 start and were 41-13 at one point, gathering pace when Klay Thompson returned after missing the previous two seasons due to injury. Jordan Poole, a third-year guard, stepped up in Thompson’s absence. He started 51 of his 76 games and averaged 18.5 points per game, providing them with another offensive danger.
At the conclusion of the season, the Warriors experienced two tough patches. The Warriors went 2-9 from February 9 to March 7. They went 1-7 from March 16 to March 30, partly due to Curry’s injury in a defeat to the Celtics.
The Warriors are responsible for the Celtics becoming a dynasty in the 1980s.
Both the Celtics and the Warriors have had dynasties. There have been a few for the Celtics. Boston dominated the late 1950s and early 1960s, reaching the NBA Finals ten times in a row. From 1957 through 1969, they competed in the championship round in 12 of the 13 years. In the 1980s, they also made it to the NBA finals five times, winning three times.
From 2015 through 2019, the Warriors appeared in the NBA Finals five times in a row. They were victorious in 2015, 2017, and 2018.
The Warriors were also a part of the Celtics’ success in the 1980s. The clubs joined together in June, shortly before the 1980 NBA Draft, to pull off a blockbuster transaction. The Celtics used their first-round selection to put together a trade to acquire Golden State big Robert Parish.
Red Auerbach, the president of the Boston Celtics, stated he preferred three prospects in the draft: center Joe Barry Carroll, forward/center Kevin McHale, and guard Darrell Griffith. Boston needed size to compete in the Eastern Conference, which is more physical. Parish, a four-year veteran who averaged 17.0 points and 10.9 rebounds in the 1979-80 season, caught Auerbach’s attention.
In the 1980 draft, Auerbach dealt the No. 1 pick and Boston’s 13th pick to the Warriors in return for Parish and Golden State’s first choice, the third overall pick. The Celtics selected McHale with that choice.
“In this draft, and there are exceptions and people may come out of nowhere,” Auerbach remarked at the time, according to The Washington Post. “There seem to be three terrific players, and the rest fall after that.” “From the outset, we didn’t give a damn which of the three we received.”
After that, the rest is history.
The next season, the Celtics won their first championship of the decade. Parish and McHale joined up with Larry Bird to create what is widely considered to be the finest frontcourt in NBA history. They also shared championships in 1984 and 1986. From 1984 to 1987, they won four consecutive championship series.
With the first overall choice, the Warriors picked Carroll. Although Carroll had a successful NBA career, Parish and McHale were inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.
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