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By: \u00a0Michael D. McClellan<\/span> |\u00a0<\/strong>The player and the teams he plays on are a paradox, unfairly dismissed as a bridge between the two greatest eras in franchise history, and alternately lionized for one triumphant moment, a contest so thrilling that the league\u2019s marketing apparatus dubs Game 5 of the 1976 NBA Finals \u201cThe Greatest Game Ever Played.\u201d\u00a0 To pigeonhole Dave Cowens and the 1970s Boston Celtics is to diss the very essence of the man who plays every possession as if it is his last.\u00a0 Cowens is a full throttle post player with no off switch, which is a damned good thing, given that he follows the greatest deal closer the game has ever known.<\/p>\n \u201cNo one could replace Bill Russell,\u201d Cowens says quickly.\u00a0 \u201cAll I could do was come in, be me, and hope that it was enough.\u201d<\/p>\n Cowens has a point.\u00a0 All Russell achieves before him is win eleven NBA championships in thirteen seasons, to go along with two NCAA titles and an Olympic gold medal.\u00a0 The undersized Cowens, by contrast, plays his collegiate basketball at Florida State and wins nothing.\u00a0 How can he expect to fill the shoes of the great Bill Russell?\u00a0 How can he ever hope to win over a Boston Garden faithful spoiled by all that winning?<\/p>\n The answer lies in Cowens\u2019 competitive drive.\u00a0 As a 6-foot-6 senior at Newport (KY) Catholic High School, Cowens leads Newport to a 29-3 record while averaging 13 points and 20 rebounds.\u00a0 When Adolph Rupp shows only lukewarm interest Cowens, he spurns his home state Kentucky Wildcats and signs with Florida State instead.\u00a0 The Seminoles win eleven games during Cowens\u2019 sophomore season, improve to 18-8 a year later, and finish 23-3 during his senior year.\u00a0 He pulls down 1,340 rebounds during his three seasons of varsity basketball, and is named to The Sporting News<\/em> All-America Second Team in 1970.<\/p>\n The 1970 NBA Draft is long on talent, and future stars Bob Lanier, Rudy Tomjanovich, and \u201cPistol\u201d Pete Maravich go 1-2-3.\u00a0 Red Auerbach passes on New Mexico State center Sam Lacey, a 6-foot-10, slick-passing shot blocker who leads the Aggies to the 1970 Final Four, and instead selects the undersized center with the outsized heart and nonstop motor.<\/p>\n \u201cEverybody, including me, thought Red was taking Lacey.\u00a0 It was a classic Red Auerbach smokescreen.\u201d<\/p>\n Cowens arrives in town unafraid of the long shadow cast by Russell and the other Ghosts of Celtics Past.\u00a0\u00a0 The rookie averages 17.0 points and 15.4 rebounds, quickly earning the respect of holdovers like Satch Sanders and John Havlicek, while going on to share Rookie of the Year honors with Portland\u2019s Geoff Petrie.<\/p>\n With Cowens serving as the catalyst, the Celtics improve from 33-48 to 44-38.\u00a0 He makes up for any height disadvantage with physicality.\u00a0 It surprises no one that Cowens leads the league in fouls as a rookie.<\/p>\n \u201cI led the team in fouls for three years,\u201d he says with a laugh.\u00a0 \u201cI had the mentality that I could guard anybody.\u00a0 I got into a little foul trouble as a result.\u201d<\/p>\n Cowens\u2019 averages 18.8 points during his second season in the league, as the new-look Celtics finish first in the Atlantic Division with a 56-26 record and reach the Eastern Conference Finals.\u00a0 A year later, the Celtics win a franchise record 68 games.\u00a0 Cowens pulls off a rare double, winning the 1973 All-Star Game MVP Award and the 1972-73 NBA\u2019s Most Valuable Player Award, joining legends Bill Russell and Bob Cousy as the only Celtics so honored in the same season.\u00a0 Both honors, however, are rendered mute when the team suffers a heartbreaking Game 7 loss to the Knicks in the Eastern Conference Finals.<\/p>\n The Celtics win 56 games during the 1973-74 regular season and finally get past the Knicks in the playoffs.\u00a0 Awaiting them in the Finals are the Milwaukee Bucks, who boast an aging star in Oscar Robertson and a young phenom in Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.\u00a0 The series goes seven games, with the Celtics winning the 1974 NBA Championship on Milwaukee\u2019s home floor.<\/p>\n A year later, the 1974-75 Boston Celtics win 60 games and capture another Atlantic Division crown.\u00a0 Cowens misses 15 games with a broken foot but averages team-highs in points (20.4) and rebounds (14.7), finishing second to Wes Unseld for the rebounding title.\u00a0 Unseld and the Washington Bullets snuff out a Celtics repeat, dropping them 4-2 in the Eastern Conference Finals.<\/p>\n Faced with the offseason threat of losing Paul Westphal to free agency, Auerbach trades the promising young guard to the Phoenix Suns for Charlie Scott, who lands in Boston nearly six seasons after Auerbach drafts him out of North Carolina. The added scoring punch helps; with Havlicek on the backside of his brilliant career, Scott averages 17.6 points and helps Boston capture a fifth consecutive Atlantic Division crown.\u00a0 The Celtics reach the 1976 NBA Finals for the second time in three seasons, beating the Phoenix Suns in that triple-overtime thriller on the Boston Garden parquet.\u00a0 One game later, the Cowens and the Celtics are world champs for the second time in three years.<\/p>\n The \u201976 title represents a high-water mark for the 1970s Celtics.\u00a0 Paul Silas is sent packing during the off-season, a move met with anger and disappointment by Cowens, who comes to rely on the power forward\u2019s gritty board work.\u00a0 And then, just eight games into the 1976-77 season, Cowens walks into Auerbach\u2019s office and drops a bombshell, requesting a leave of absence from the team.\u00a0 He returns home to his family farm in Kentucky and sells Scotch Pine trees.<\/p>\n Cowens\u2019 temporary \u201cretirement\u201d lasts nearly thirty games.\u00a0 The Celtics finish second in the Atlantic Division before falling to the Philadelphia 76ers in the Eastern Conference Finals.<\/p>\n The Celtics bottom out during the 1978-79 season, a dysfunctional descent into the abyss.\u00a0 The ugliness of that 29-win season is mercifully short-lived, as Larry Bird joins the Celtics a season later and jump starts the Big Three Era.\u00a0 The Celtics win 61 games in what turns out to be Cowens\u2019 last season with the team.\u00a0 He retires again, only to be coaxed back onto the court two years later by former teammate Don Nelson, who is now the head coach in Milwaukee.<\/p>\n \u201cIt didn\u2019t take me long to realize it was time to go,\u201d Cowens says.\u00a0 \u201cThe fire wasn\u2019t there.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t have the same intensity.\u201d<\/p>\n Dave Cowens walks away for good, his legacy in Boston firmly wedged between Bill Russell and Larry Bird, his accomplishments unfairly obscured by the two greatest players in franchise history.<\/p>\n \u201cThere are worse things than getting lost in the conversation of the greatest Celtics every,\u201d Cowens says quickly.\u00a0 \u201cI came into the league my own man, and I played the game the only way I knew how.\u00a0 At the end of the day, I gave it everything I had.\u00a0 I hope that was enough.\u201d<\/p>\n You were born on October 25, 1948 in Newport, KY.\u00a0 Please tell me a little about your childhood in Newport, and also about your basketball career at Newport Central Catholic High School.<\/strong><\/p>\n I came from a large family with four brothers and one sister.\u00a0 We were spread out, age-wise \u2013 the youngest two weren\u2019t born until my teens \u2013 so the oldest of us had a lot of responsibility around the house.\u00a0 There were chores to do, siblings to care for, and homework assignments to finish.\u00a0 It was busy, but really no different than any other family situation.\u00a0 You were expected to step up and do your part.<\/p>\n Central Catholic was an all-boys high school, and heavy on sports.\u00a0 I ran track and field for four years, played freshman football, and swam as a sophomore.\u00a0 I grew five inches between my sophomore and junior years, and that\u2019s when my basketball career really took off.\u00a0 We made the state tournament during my senior season, and by then I\u2019d started getting a lot of attention from college recruiters.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Your father wanted to you stay in Kentucky, but you ultimately chose FSU.\u00a0 Did you ever regret your decision play outside of the state?<\/strong><\/p>\n Not really.\u00a0 By graduation I wanted to be away from home, and to experience something altogether new.\u00a0 I looked at the map and knew that Florida was nice for a lot of different reasons.\u00a0 When you go to an all-boys high school, there comes a point when you realize you\u2019re missing out on a lot.\u00a0 At Florida State, the ratio was something like 4-to-1 in favor of the girls, so that definitely had a certain amount of appeal to me \u2013 but when I got there I still had a hard time getting dates [laughs].\u00a0 I had no money and wasn\u2019t a big man on campus, so the girls really showed no interest.<\/p>\n My parents understood my decision, but it wasn\u2019t easy on either of them.\u00a0 They had watched all of us play sports growing up, were members of the boosters club, and were at all of our high school games regardless of where they were being played.\u00a0 They were also very active in the school, so they would have preferred to have had me closer to home.\u00a0 That way they could have seen me play more, taken trips to the road games, things like that.<\/p>\n I wanted to play basketball.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t\u2019 want to sit on the bench and watch the action.\u00a0 My father wanted me to play at UK, but I didn\u2019t know how I\u2019d measure up.\u00a0 Florida State had no basketball\u00a0tradition, and it was an independent school at the time.\u00a0 There was no SEC conference and no tournament to go along with it.\u00a0 The program was also on probation, but those things really didn\u2019t matter to me at the time.\u00a0 I just wanted to play as much as possible, and as soon as possible.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Your coach at Florida State was Hugh Durham, who is one of just 11 Division I coaches to lead two different schools to the NCAA Final Four (Florida State, 1972 & Georgia, 1983).\u00a0 Please tell me a little about Mr. Durham.<\/strong><\/p>\n Hugh is the man who sold me on Florida State University.\u00a0 If it hadn\u2019t been for him I\u2019m not sure I would have gone to school there.\u00a0 He worked my tail off and made me a better player, and he made me prove to him that I could perform on the basketball court.<\/p>\n We both share Kentucky roots \u2013 Hugh is from Louisville, where he was a triple sport star in high school.\u00a0 He played basketball at Florida State in the 1950s, got his masters from the school and began his coaching career there as an assistant coach to Bud Kennedy.\u00a0 Hugh became the head coach in 1966, right when I was looking at colleges, and he really impressed me with what he wanted to do down there.\u00a0 He wanted to play an up-tempo style, and he wanted to fast break at every opportunity.\u00a0 I liked the idea of pushing the basketball.\u00a0 Attacking, that was my style.\u00a0 I felt like my talents could be used to their fullest in his system, and that\u2019s what made the Florida State program so appealing.<\/p>\n You just have to look at the FSU record book to know that Hugh was one heck of a player, and he\u2019s an even better coach.\u00a0 He took FSU to the Final Four, and then he did it again with the University of Georgia.\u00a0 He won more games at Georgia than any other coach.\u00a0 He has the best winning percentage of any coach in the history of FSU.\u00a0 I can\u2019t say enough about Hugh Durham.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n You were selected by the Celtics with the fourth overall pick of the 1970 NBA Draft.\u00a0 Were you aware that Bob Cousy and the Cincinnati Royals wanted you with the fifth pick?<\/strong><\/p>\n Yes.\u00a0 As a senior in college I had an idea that the Royals were interested.\u00a0 They needed a big man, and there was some early talk that it was going to either be me or Sam Lacey.\u00a0 It was all speculation, just like it is today, but I did have a pretty good idea both teams were looking at me.\u00a0 Prior to my senior year I was asked to fill out questionnaires, which were used as part of the scouting process.\u00a0 So you knew what teams were interested based on who asked you to fill one out.\u00a0 But you have to remember that the draft was much different back then \u2013 you didn\u2019t have the hoopla surrounding it like you do today.\u00a0 It wasn\u2019t covered around the clock, and it wasn\u2019t a made-for-TV production like you have now.\u00a0 The ABA and the NBA were both competing for the same talent, which meant you had this competition between the leagues helping to drive up player salaries.\u00a0 That was one thing we had working in our favor.<\/p>\n All the talk coming out of Boston had Red selecting Sam Lacey with the fourth pick.\u00a0 Bob had the fifth pick, and right up until the night before it looked like Lacey to the Celtics.\u00a0 That was Red\u2019s bluff all along.\u00a0 He saw me play during my senior season and left the game at halftime to throw everybody off.\u00a0 He didn\u2019t want anyone to think he was interested.\u00a0 That was classic Red.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Former Celtic great Frank Ramsey negotiated his first contract in the dugout at Fenway Park.\u00a0 What was it like to talk contract with Red?<\/strong><\/p>\n Back then you had the deal pretty much worked out, because the NBA wanted to make sure that the ABA didn\u2019t raid the top talent.\u00a0 The team assumed the deal, the salary was agreed upon, and the contract got done.\u00a0 Perks were negotiable \u2013 car stipends, things like that.<\/p>\n Agents typically took a 10% cut off the top, but I was able to get an agreement in place for 5%.\u00a0 Norm Blass, a New York-based attorney, took care of everything for me and negotiated the points of the contract.\u00a0 So it wasn\u2019t like in the days when Frank played.\u00a0 Back then you didn\u2019t have agents and there was no competition for your services.\u00a0 You look at a player like Bob Pettit, who was the league MVP in 1956 and 1959, and his highest annual salary was less than what I made during my rookie year.\u00a0 The older players held down other jobs after the season was over, and a lot of them ran basketball camps to help supplement their income.\u00a0 My camp was started thirty-two years ago for the very same reason.\u00a0 Players today don\u2019t have to do that.\u00a0 They\u2019re millionaires before they ever play a single minute in the NBA.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n You were co-winner of the Rookie of the Year award, averaging 17.0 points and 15.4 rebounds.\u00a0 Were you surprised at how quickly you became an impact player in the NBA?<\/strong><\/p>\n I honestly didn\u2019t know what to expect.\u00a0 I\u2019d played up-tempo in high school and college, and my conditioning was at a very high level.\u00a0 I was used to pushing through various thresholds of pain and fatigue, even when other players were having trouble.\u00a0 The league at that time suited my style perfectly.\u00a0 When you watch an NBA game today, you\u2019re lucky to see either team break 100 points.\u00a0 It\u2019s become a half court game.\u00a0 When we played it was nothing to see a 130-128 score \u2013 today that\u2019s unheard of.\u00a0 That gets back to the up-tempo style of NBA basketball when I played.\u00a0 There was much more ball movement \u2013 isolation plays just didn\u2019t exist the way they do today \u2013 and there was much quicker ball movement.\u00a0 The pace was just so much different.\u00a0 You\u2019d cross mid-court, there would be one or two passes, and then the shot would go up.\u00a0 The strategy of running the play clock down to zero wasn\u2019t in vogue.\u00a0 Neither were the defensive schemes that you see now.\u00a0 We played defense back then, but the league wasn\u2019t as diluted as it is now.\u00a0 You had better shooters, and players who were better at the fundamentals.\u00a0 Part of the problem today has been league expansion and the influx of high school players.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n What was it like following the Bill Russell as the Celtics\u2019 next great center?<\/strong><\/p>\n I just went into it with everything I had.\u00a0 I played hard every night, gave maximum effort and tried to do my best.\u00a0 You can\u2019t replace a Bill Russell.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n As a rookie, you led the league in fouls.\u00a0 Was this the result of your incredible intensity or an example of negative rookie calls, and did Satch Sanders ever razz you about breaking his then-team record of fouls in a season? I led the team in fouls for three years [laughs].\u00a0 I had the mentality that I could guard anybody, and there were times when I\u2019d be playing defense well beyond the lane.\u00a0 When I played, there were scoring big men on almost every team and it was always a challenge to stop them.\u00a0 Bob Lanier, Wilt Chamberlain, Kareem, Bob Bellamy, Willis Reed \u2013 every night it was a completely different style, a different matchup, but all of these guys could score.\u00a0 That was the one constant.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The Celtics played the Los Angeles Lakers three times during their record-setting 33-game winning streak during the 1971-72 season.<\/strong><\/p>\n The Lakers had a heck of a team for three or four years during that period.\u00a0 They had great players at almost every position, but they also had great depth.\u00a0 That was the big difference between them and everyone else. They kept the pressure on their opponents in every game that season, and they were practically unbeatable.\u00a0 To win 69 games and lose only 13 \u2013 and to win thirty-three in a row \u2013 is a testament to the talent on that team.\u00a0 Wilt, Gail and Jerry are all in the Hall of Fame, and these are still three of the best ever at their positions.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n That team was coached by former Celtic great Bill Sharman.\u00a0 Did you know Bill?<\/strong><\/p>\n Bill Sharman is a nice man, a true gentleman.\u00a0 I had a chance to play in a pickup game with him when he coached the LA Stars of the ABA.\u00a0 He was the perfect coach for the 1971-72 Lakers.\u00a0 He treated them like veterans, and they responded by playing like champions.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Tell me about playing against Wilt Chamberlain.<\/strong><\/p>\n Wilt was one of the most dominant players in NBA history.\u00a0 People talk about Shaq being an unstoppable force, but Wilt during that era was even more so.\u00a0 He was Rookie of the Year, a four-time league MVP, a Finals MVP, a two-time NBA champion \u2013 and that doesn\u2019t even touch his 100 point game or his 50 point scoring average in the early sixties.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n What do you remember about\u00a0<\/strong>Gail Goodrich?<\/strong><\/p>\n Gail played for Coach Wooden at UCLA, and helped the Bruins win their first two NCAA championships. He was left-handed, and he had a great shooting touch.\u00a0 A lot of people thought he was too small to play NBA basketball, but he was as tough as anybody on their team.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n How about Jerry West?<\/strong><\/p>\n Jerry was the best pure shooter in the game.\u00a0 He scored all those points during the regular season, but he was even better during the playoffs.\u00a0 When you have players like these on your team, and you have great depth, then you\u2019re going to be hard to beat.\u00a0 The Lakers were like that during the 1971-72 season.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The Celtics acquired Paul Silas from the Phoenix Suns prior to the 1972-73 season.\u00a0 Please tell me about Paul, and what he meant to the team.<\/strong><\/p>\n Paul complemented me very well.\u00a0 He liked playing on the inside, whereas I liked playing both inside and out.\u00a0 He was a veteran who knew how to play the game.\u00a0 He gave me the comfort level I needed to stray away from the basket.\u00a0 He wasn\u2019t big, but he was the best rebounder in the league.\u00a0 He\u2019s a prime example of size not being the most important factor when it comes to rebounding the basketball.\u00a0 Skill level, positioning, knowing how to play the game \u2013 these things are more important.\u00a0 It takes a special mentality to be a great rebounder, and Paul had that.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The Celtics won a franchise record 68 games during the 1972-73 season.\u00a0 However, the team suffered a heartbreaking Game 7 loss to the Knicks in the Eastern Conference Finals.<\/strong><\/p>\n The Knicks had the second best team in the NBA that season.\u00a0 There wasn\u2019t anyone in the West that could contend, so we know that whoever won the series would end up winning it all.\u00a0 That\u2019s the way both teams looked at it.\u00a0 We all felt the Eastern Conference Finals was for the championship.\u00a0\u00a0We lost Havlicek for that series to a shoulder injury, and that really caused problems early on.\u00a0 We fell behind 3-1 in that series before turning it around and forcing a Game 7 back in Boston.\u00a0 We were confident going in \u2013 we had Havlicek back, and he started \u2013 but we ran out of gas.\u00a0 We spent everything just clawing back to even the series at 3-3, and we didn\u2019t shoot the ball well.\u00a0\u00a0Even though we didn\u2019t win, we felt we had a great team.\u00a0 We came within one win of matching the \u201971-72 Lakers for best season ever, and we felt just as good as that team.\u00a0 But John\u2019s injury hurt, no question about that.\u00a0 It was a tough series to lose.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n What one characteristic most personifies the way you played the game? Enthusiasm.\u00a0 I was very much a Dennis the Menace on the court.\u00a0 My attitude was to play all out, and to just let it rip.\u00a0 I was always running.\u00a0 I stayed in constant motion, running fast and trying to wear my opponent down.\u00a0 I viewed my job as an individual contest within a team contest, and the object was to outwork everyone that I was matched up against.\u00a0 When the ball went up I wanted to be the one coming down with it.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Take me back to the \u201870s.\u00a0 What was the style of basketball like back then? There was a much more crowd-pleasing brand of basketball being played.\u00a0 The ABA had the great flair, and the NBA had the old school franchises.\u00a0 You had players like Tiny Archibald and Bob McAdoo.\u00a0 You had Rick Barry, Bobby Jones, David Thompson, Dr. J, Chet Walker, Dan Issel, Bob “Butterbean” Love.\u00a0 You had Rudy Tomjanovich, who was one of the greatest shooters to ever play the game.\u00a0 It was a great era, but it gets overlooked because of the players who came along during the \u201880s \u2013 the Birds, the Magics, the Jordans.<\/p>\n I\u2019m not a fan of the three-point play, which has become such a big deal today.\u00a0 The big men don\u2019t get the touches that they got when I played, and a lot of it has to do with the three-pointer.\u00a0 Today you see so much isolation.\u00a0 There was much more ball movement back then, which made it more fun to watch.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n By 1973 you were the NBA All-Star Game MVP and the league\u2019s Most Valuable Player. It was an honor to be voted the league\u2019s best, because the players and coaches voted for the MVP during that time.\u00a0 It meant something to have my peers recognize my effort.\u00a0 I was never out to impress some guy who has never played the game.\u00a0 I shared the Rookie of the Year award with Geoff Petrie \u2013 it was a media thing, so it didn\u2019t mean as much to me as winning the MVP award.\u00a0 Back then the award wasn\u2019t such a big deal \u2013 at least not like it is today.\u00a0 When you look at a picture of me receiving the award, you can see that the ball is made out of wrapping tape.\u00a0 You wouldn\u2019t see that today \u2013 it\u2019s much more of a production, and it means much more in terms of money.<\/p>\n Being named MVP probably had a lot to do with our winning 68 games that year.\u00a0 We only lost fourteen games, so you figure somebody on the team had to get it.\u00a0 John [Havlicek] had to be considered, because he had such a great season and he was our go-to guy on offense.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n In Game 7 of the 1974 NBA Finals, head coach Tommy Heinsohn changed his strategy against Milwaukee center Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.\u00a0 Please take me back to that game, and your role in slowing down the Bucks\u2019 star. Up until that point I\u2019d played four years in the NBA with zero help on Kareem.\u00a0 It was a case where you had to suck it up, and on many occasions he made me feel like anything but an MVP.\u00a0 My goal was always to stay close statistically \u2013 if he scored 35 then I wanted to at least score twenty, so that there was only a fifteen point differential.\u00a0 Today Shaq can go off for 40 and hold his opponent to four, which is a huge amount to make up.<\/p>\n Tommy decided to double up on Kareem in that game, and it came as a real surprise to the Bucks.\u00a0 We\u2019d never practiced this scheme, but our team was smart enough to pull it off.\u00a0 We wanted to slow down the Bucks\u2019 offense, and make players like Cornell Warner and Curtis Perry beat us.\u00a0 We wanted them to shoot, which was something that they weren\u2019t used to doing.\u00a0 We also wanted to keep the ball out of Oscar Robertson\u2019s hands and make other players handle it.\u00a0 Don Chaney\u2019s sole focus in that game was to dog Oscar.\u00a0 He kept the pressure on him, took a lot of time off the clock, and forced the Bucks into rushing their offensive sets.\u00a0 The plan worked perfectly.\u00a0 We won Game 7 on the road, 102-87, and brought home the championship.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Is it true that you slept on a park bench in Boston Common following that \u201974 championship against the Bucks?<\/strong><\/p>\n We won the championship on May 12th, which was Mother\u2019s Day.\u00a0 It was an afternoon game, so we flew back to Boston and headed straight for the big celebrations around town.\u00a0 My brother was with me \u2013 we spent the evening walking through the masses of people, and then around 8PM we jumped in his car and went home.\u00a0 I was too hyped to sleep, so I drove back into Boston, stayed out late and visited with friends around town \u2013 we drank champagne, celebrated the big win, had a great time.\u00a0 It was either very late or very early, depending on how you looked at it, and I was dead tired from all the excitement.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t want to take a chance on driving, so when I saw the bench I decided to catch some Z\u2019s.\u00a0 When I woke up on Monday morning I learned that there was a parade being organized.\u00a0 That\u2019s where I went.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The Celtics won the 1976 NBA Championship, defeating the Phoenix Suns in a series most noted for that triple-overtime thriller on the Boston Garden parquet.<\/strong><\/p>\n At times it seems as if that’s the only game anyone has ever watched me play in \u2013 that and the Milwaukee game, when I dove on the floor [laughs].\u00a0 Obviously, that is the one game that everyone remembers.\u00a0 It was a crazy game \u2013 we got up big and then let it slip.\u00a0 It was a classic coaching chess match \u2013 the bench played a huge role.\u00a0 Glenn McDonald was incredibly important, and that series is what he is best remembered for. He came into the game and played loose. He always kept himself ready to play.<\/p>\n At the end of the second overtime we thought it was over.\u00a0 All we wanted to do was get the heck out of there, and that\u2019s what we did.\u00a0 We all got off the floor.\u00a0 Bob Ryan later told me that Havlicek had his shoes off, and that someone else had their ankle-tape cut off.\u00a0 There was pandemonium going on.\u00a0 I saw the game on film a few years ago, and Dennis Awtrey and Ricky Sobers were punching people.\u00a0 Then to get everyone off the floor and Gar Heard comes back and hits that shot to send it into triple overtime. That is what was so amazing about the game, to have so many things like that happen.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Please tell me about the late Johnny Most, and what he meant to the Boston Celtics.<\/strong><\/p>\n Johnny was the team\u2019s true Sixth Man.\u00a0 Everybody knew him \u2013 he was a mainstay of the club, as much a part of it in some respects as Red.\u00a0 He had that unique voice.\u00a0 It was a gift.\u00a0 How he spoke, the things he said\u2026he was the Boston Celtics\u2019 biggest proponent..\u00a0 He was also a major league homer, just like Chick Hearn was with the Lakers, and you needed that.\u00a0 He had one of the most famous voices in sports.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Eight games into the 1976-77 season you temporarily retired from the Boston Celtics.\u00a0 How did Red handle this situation?<\/strong><\/p>\n He didn\u2019t try to change my mind or stand in my way.\u00a0 He said that he wanted me to remain on the team, but that he understood my reasons and respected my decision.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Had you never played basketball and the world had never heard of Dave Cowens, what would you have liked to have done with your life?<\/strong><\/p>\n I would have probably entered the service, or done something in construction.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Final Question:\u00a0 If you could offer one piece of advice on life to others, what would that be?<\/strong><\/p>\n Maintain humility.\u00a0 Do good for others.\u00a0 Rise above adversity.\u00a0 Compete and achieve.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By: \u00a0Michael D. McClellan |\u00a0The player and the teams he plays on are a paradox, unfairly dismissed as a bridge between the two greatest eras in franchise history, and alternately lionized for one triumphant moment, a contest so thrilling that the league\u2019s marketing apparatus dubs Game 5 of the 1976 NBA Finals \u201cThe Greatest Game […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16011,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","iawp_total_views":9,"footnotes":""},"categories":[773,775],"tags":[202],"class_list":["post-10388","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured-interview","category-team-green","tag-dave-cowens"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.celtic-nation.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10388","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.celtic-nation.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.celtic-nation.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.celtic-nation.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.celtic-nation.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10388"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.celtic-nation.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10388\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.celtic-nation.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16011"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.celtic-nation.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.celtic-nation.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.celtic-nation.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.celtic-nation.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/12\/basketball.png\")
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