NBA Finals preview: Boston Celtics face Golden State Warriors with eye on record 18th title-Sports News , Firstpost

Boston Celtics guard Jaylen Brown and coach Ime Udoka at a training session ahead of the Finals against Golden State Warriors. AP

The Boston Celtics will be aiming to become the most successful team in NBA history when they take on the Golden State Warriors in the Finals of the 75th season of the league starting Thursday.

Eastern Conference winners Celtics currently are tied with Los Angeles Lakers at 17 titles, and will hope to lift the Larry O’Brien Trophy for an unprecedented 18th time in the best-of-seven finals against Western Conference champions Warriors.

A victory for the Celtics will make coach Ime Udoka the first in seven seasons and only the 10th overall in NBA history to win a title in their debut season. The last coach to achieve the feat was Golden State Warriors’ Steve Kerr back in 2015.

The Celtics are making their first appearance in the NBA finals in more than a decade, having lost to a Kobe Bryant-led Lakers in 2010 the last time they made it this far in the league. The last of their 17 titles came two years earlier, in a 4-2 win over the same side.

The Warriors, on the other hand, are eyeing a fourth title in eight years.

The Kerr-coached side had made five consecutive Finals between 2015 and 2019 — winning three titles in four years between 2015 and 2018 and finishing runners-up to Cleveland Cavaliers and Toronto Raptors in 2016 and 2019 respectively.

The two teams are locked 1-1 as far as their season head-to-head record goes. The Warriors had won at Boston on 17 December in a closely-fought affair that ended 111-107 in their favour. The Celtics then returned the favour in San Francisco on 16 March in a much more convincing fashion, winning 110-88.

The last time these two teams met in the NBA finals was way back in 1964 when the Warriors — then known as the San Franciso Warriors — lost to the Celtics 4-1, giving them their sixth title on the trot.

Ahead of the Finals which begins Thursday at the Warriors’ home turf of Chase Center, we take a look at some of the other talking points:

Head-to-Head History

The Celtics and Warriors will meet in the NBA Finals for the first time in 58 years and the second time overall. The 1964 championship series between Boston and the San Francisco Warriors – won by the Celtics in five games – marked the first NBA Finals matchup between legends Bill Russell (Boston) and Wilt Chamberlain (San Francisco), whose rivalry helped define the sport for a decade. The Celtics and Warriors also met three other times in the playoffs when the Warriors called Philadelphia home before moving West in 1962.

Star Power

This series is stocked with standouts. Golden State guard Stephen Curry, a two-time NBA MVP and NBA 75th Anniversary Team selection, and Boston forward Jayson Tatum made the 2021-22 All-NBA Team. Warriors forwards Draymond Green and Andrew Wiggins joined Curry and Tatum as selections to the 2022 NBA All-Star Game. Green is also a former NBA Defensive Player of the Year – an award won by Celtics guard Marcus Smart this season. Boston forward-center Al Horford and Golden State guard Klay Thompson are both five-time NBA All-Stars. Celtics guard Jaylen Brown was an NBA All-Star last season.

The Stuff of Legend

Western Conference Finals MVP Stephen Curry of Golden State is one step away from burnishing his legacy as an NBA legend. A series victory would give the NBA 75th Anniversary Team member and three-point king four NBA championships to go with two NBA MVP awards. The short list of six players to win at least four NBA championships and two NBA MVP awards is a who’s who of basketball royalty: Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Tim Duncan, LeBron James, Magic Johnson, Michael Jordan and Bill Russell.

New on the Scene

No player on the Celtics’ roster has ever played in the NBA Finals before. Boston is looking to accomplish what the Milwaukee Bucks did last season: win the NBA championship without a player on the roster with previous NBA Finals experience. The Warriors also won it all in the 2014-15 season with no previous NBA Finals experience – the first of their five consecutive Finals appearances.

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