Since Larry Bird entered the struggling league in 1979 and resuscitated a flagging franchise, Boston had posted the best composite record in the league and won three NBA titles, despite playing two-thirds of its games in the rugged Eastern Conference – and having key injuries cost them at least two more crowns, and probably more.
But just six contests into the 1988-89 NBA season, the fortunes of the franchise and in turn the league took a dramatic downturn.
Already the Celtics, seemingly on the verge of another run of championships after a transcendent 67-15 title season in 1985-86, had been shaken by the death of top draft pick Len Bias that summer, as well as the injury-forced retirements of top reserves Bill Walton and Scott Wedman.
Many basketball observers consider that the best team in league annals, and adding sure-fire star Bias to the roster would have allowed its stars more rest instead of playing too much and getting injuries which curtailed careers.
Without Bias and their top two reserves, an aging and battered Boston squad still had managed to soldier on, remaining title contenders, a feared team built on great skill and halfcourt execution, high basketball IQ, competitive grit and guile.
The signs were there that the third Celtic dynasty was starting to crumble, however. Kevin McHale had missed the first 21 games of the 1987-88 campaign due to foot surgery after the grueling and heroic run of the short-handed Celtics to the 1987 Finals.
Center Robert Parish was 34 and lead guard Dennis Johnson was an old 33. Hyper guard Danny Ainge was the young pup of the iron five at nearly 30.
And Bird, after earning first team all-league honors in each of his first nine seasons from 1979-88, was nearing 32. The year before he had posted his highest scoring average and the best in Celtic annals at 29.9, good for third in the NBA behind less well-rounded gunners Michael Jordan and Dominique Wilkins.
But the weight of carrying the team on his balky back had started to take a toll. A few months earlier the previous spring, he had answered any remaining critics and reinforced his greatness with a classic seventh game shootout win over Atlanta and Dominique Wilkins.
With many fans expecting Boston to wilt against the younger, high-flying Hawks, Larry Legend refused to give in to Father Time.
In a fourth quarter for the ages, Bird sank nine of 10 field goal attempts, including a three-point goal and a miraculous three-point falling-down, left-handed hook. The only shot he missed, a 20-footer over Kevin Willis, rimmed all the way down and came out, or he would have shot 10-10.
Boston needed every shot he made to pull out a 118-116 victory. But in the conference finals against Detroit, even Bird showed he was human.
A year before, his spectacular steal and assist to DJ with a second left in game five had lifted Boston to a seven-game epic win over the young, hungry and bruising Pistons.
But a year later in 1988, a more experienced and determined Detroit squad knocked off Boston 4-2 as the Pistons limited Bird to
It was the first time since 1983 that Boston had not advanced to the NBA Finals, a four-year East run that has yet to be surpassed since. The 2011-14 Miami Heat equaled the run, but did so in an East so weak by comparison that one has to call it a JV conference compared to the 1980s Eastern gauntlet of Boston, the 76ers, Pistons, Bucks and Hawks.
After torching the Hawks, Bird was swarmed by the brutal Bad Boy Piston defense and relegated to just 19.8 points per game on very un-Larry like 35 percent field goal shooting.
True to his all-around contributions, Bird did manage to pull down over 12 rebounds per contest and dish out 6.2 assists while making nearly three steals a game in the series while shooting 86 percent from the charity stripe.
But his bad shooting was a key to the loss that finally toppled Boston from its 1984-87 Eastern perch.
The hoped-for redemptive 1988-89 season opened early with Boston playing in the second McDonald’s Open four-team tournament in Spain. Already worn down by making it to at least the East finals eight times in the previous nine years, the older Celtics were not happy about making the overseas trip.
But it was the first Mickey D’s Open abroad, so the NBA and commissioner David Stern wanted to send their most storied franchise overseas to represent the league.
After a slow start, the Celtics cruised to a pair of wins over teams featuring several Yugoslavian future NBA standouts like Drazen Petrovic, Vlade Divac, Toni Kukoc and mid-1990s Celtic Dino Radja.
But the pre-season trip took an extra toll on the brittle short-handed team, in its first season under new head coach Jimmy Rodgers. K.C. Jones, a player favorite, had been deposed after five seasons where he guided the Celtics to two NBA titles, four NBA Finals and five East Finals.
Long-time assistant Rodgers assumed the reins partly to appease him and keep the curly-headed strategist from going to the rival Knicks, who had tried to hire Jimmy away as their head coach.
He agreed to stay in Boston on the promise he would take over once K.C. stepped down, but it was his bad luck to finally take over when the aging team was about to crumble when its superstar finally succumbed to injury.
The season opened well enough on November 4 at home against the Knicks. The Celtics rallied late before the typical sellout crowd at the Boston Garden to force overtime at 107-107.
In the extra session Boston pulled away from the frisky Knicks 15-8 to win going away, 122-115. Bird led all scorers with 29 points on 12 of 23 field goal shooting and perfect five for five free throw accuracy.
Larry Legend added four blocked shots (yes four), five assists, two steals but disturbingly, only five rebounds in 47 minutes. For a player who had averaged nearly 11 caroms a game in his career to that point, to grab just five boards (all on the defensive glass) in so many minutes was a telling sign that perhaps something was not quite right.
McHale fired in 25 points while Parish contributed 21 points and 22 rebounds as all five Celtic starters scored double figures. Patrick Ewing topped NY with 28 points, while reigning Rookie of the Year point guard Mark Jackson, who would play for Bird a decade later when he coached the Indiana Pacers to the Finals, tallied 16 with six assists.
The next night at another fierce Eastern rival in Philadelphia, the cracks showed clearly. The 76ers blew Boston away with a 41-24 third period en route to a 129-115 victory.
Bird sank 13 of his 22 fielders and scored 27 points with seven assists and five rebounds in just 31 minutes. Parish netted 19 and McHale 18.
But the Sixers overwhelmed the Celtics, shooting 57 percent from the field on 51 of 89 accuracy. Cliff Robinson led the victors with 25 points, while Charles Barkley netted 24 and Mike Gminski added 18.
Even former Celtic guard Gerald Henderson, traded in 1984 to Seattle for the draft pick that turned into the Len Bias choice, came off the Sixer bench to score 14 points, make three steals and dole out six assists in just 23 minutes.
The poor showing might be explained away by back-to-back tough games against heated rivals trying their best to beat Boston. But the brutal opening schedule would not let up for the Celts as the league’s TV darlings returned home Nov. 9 to face the Chicago Bulls and Michael Jordan.
Boston bounced back from an early deficit to lead 79-78 heading to the final period. Normally at home, the Celtics would then put opponents away in the final quarter.
But the young and determined Bulls, who had been swept out of the playoffs by Boston in 1986 and 1987 and had lost 17 in a row at one point to the Celtics, did not seem intimidated anymore.
They outscored Boston 32-25 in the fourth stanza to pull out a 110-104 win. Jordan fired in 52 points on 18-33 field shooting, two treys and 14-16 at the foul line. He would go on to win his first season MVP (Bird was second) and lead the league in scoring at 35 ppg, while Larry finished third in ppg despite taking over 600 fewer combined field goal and foul shot attempts than MJ.
The rest of the Bull starting lineup attempted just a combined 31 shots, but with Bird struggling to make just seven of 19 from the floor, Chicago pulled off the upset. It was more evidence that the league may have been catching up to Boston, and also that the Celtics still were the team to beat since they got every other team’s best shot each game.
McHale tallied 29 points but Parish scored just nine. Bird grabbed a season-best 10 boards in 34 minutes, all on the defensive glass. He also passed out six assists. Ro
okie guard Brian Shaw, starting in place of an injured Ainge, tallied 18.
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