The Celtics celebrate after winning the 2008 NBA Finals.
1957 NBA Championship
The Boston Celtics banked the first of their NBA-leading 18 titles in the 1957 season. They were the best team in the league during the regular season, going 44-28 while no other squad got to 40. It was a breakthrough for coach Red Auerbach and the core of players who would go on to build the greatest dynasty in league history. Bob Cousy won MVP that season, Tom Heinsohn won Rookie of the Year and Bill Russell led the league in rebounds as a rookie. The St. Louis Hawks pushed the Finals to seven games, but the Celtics prevailed 125-123 in the clincher to give them their first of 18 rings.
1959 NBA Championship
After falling to the Hawks in six games in 1958, the Celtics got back to the mountaintop in 1959 and sparked a run of eight consecutive championships. The core from the 1957 championship team was not only still intact but improving. The Celtics cruised through the regular season at 52-20 while averaging a league-best 116.4 points per game, which was 3.4 points better than the No. 2 scoring team. Bill Russell won another rebounding crown at 23.0 boards per game and Bob Cousy won the assists crown with 8.6 assists per game. The Celtics drew the Minneapolis Lakers in the Finals and won in a sweep.
1960 NBA Championship
The Celtics continued their ascent in 1960, winning 59 games en route to repeating as champions. Boston went 59-16 in the regular season to win the Eastern Division crown. The Celtics needed to raise their game that year, though, because the league around them was getting better. The Philadelphia Warriors had just drafted a player by the name of Wilt Chamberlain, who not only won Rookie of the Year but also league MVP. The two teams met in the Eastern Division Finals, where the Celtics won in six to set up another date with the Hawks in the Finals. Boston prevailed, again in seven games, to win their second straight title.
1961 NBA Championship
The league added another future legend in 1961 with Oscar Robertson being drafted by the Royals. However, the Celtics were still the class of the league and showed it again with their third straight title. The Celtics regular season performance dropped off slightly (57-22) but they had a more dominant playoff run than the year prior. Boston won both the Eastern Division Finals and the NBA Finals in five games each. Bill Russell captured the second of his five MVP awards in this season as well.
1962 NBA Championship
The 1962 Celtics won 60 games while averaging an impressive 121.1 points per game and playing lockdown defense with an NBA-best 85.1 defensive rating. Bill Russell won his second consecutive NBA MVP award by averaging 18.9 points, 23.6 rebounds and 4.5 assists per game. The Celtics had a tough road to the NBA Finals that season. The Wilt Chamberlain-led Philadelphia Warriors took the Celtics to seven games, but the experienced C’s prevailed and made it to the next round. They drew the Lakers, who were led by Elgin Baylor and Jerry West. The Lakers took the Celtics to the brink, but Boston won 110-107 in Game 7.
1963 NBA Championship
1963 brought another title to Boston and another MVP to Bill Russell’s trophy case. The team went 58-22 and Russell averaged over 23 rebounds per game yet again. They endured a pair of big tests in the playoffs, beginning with Oscar Robertson and the Cincinnati Royals in the Eastern Division Finals. Robertson was tough for the Celtics to contain as he averaged 33.4 points, 12.4 rebounds and 8.6 rebounds. Robertson’s star power couldn’t match Boston’s talent depth, though. Tom Heinsohn, Sam Jones, Bill Russell, Bob Cousy and a young John Havlicek outlasted them and advanced to the Finals, where they beat the Lakers in six games.
1964 NBA Championship
The Celtics were going for their sixth straight title in 1964. They battled their way to a 59-win season to earn the top seed out of the Eastern Division. Bill Russell did not win MVP for the first time since 1960, but he did average a career-best 24.7 rebounds per game. The Celtics were at the peak of their powers in the playoffs as they defeated the Royals and the Warriors in five games each.
1965 NBA Championship
Boston’s 62 regular-season wins in the 1965 season were their high watermark from this era and stood as the team’s record until the 1980s. Russell won yet another MVP this season by averaging 14.1 points and 24.1 rebounds per game. The playoffs brought another big test for this team, though, as each opponent was trying to knock off the reigning six-time champs. Wilt Chamberlain and the 76ers pushed the Celtics to seven games, but Boston prevailed with a one-point win in Game 7. That proved to be Boston’s biggest challenge, however. They took care of the Lakers in five games to win their seventh straight championship.
1966 NBA Championship
1966 marked the first year during this dynasty that the Celtics did not win the Eastern Division. That distinction belonged to the 76ers, who won 55 games in the regular season. The Celtics, therefore, had to embark on a longer path to a championship. They took down the Royals in Game 5 of a best-of-five set in the Eastern Semis to advance to the Eastern Division Finals, where they would once again square off against the 76ers. Boston skated by the Sixers, finishing the series in five games to set up another finals showdown against the Lakers. This was an epic Finals that went to seven games. The Celtics dropped the opener and then rattled off three straight wins to push the Lakers to the brink. LA managed wins in Game 5 and 6 to force it to the all-important Game 7. The Celtics won, 95-93, thanks in large part to Bill Russell going for 25 points and 32 rebounds to edge out great performances from West and Baylor on the other side. With the Finals victory, the Celtics had done the impossible and won an eighth consecutive championship.
1968 NBA Championship
Player/head coach Bill Russell won 11 total championships with Boston during his 13-year career. The first of his two as a player and coach came in 1968 when the Celtics defeated the rival Lakers 4-2. ‘Bill the Hill’ averaged 14.4 points and 22.8 rebounds over the course of 19 playoff games that year, while a 27-year-old John Havlicek led all players in points (493) and assists (142) to claim the tenth championship in Boston’s storied history.
1969 NBA Championship
Russell won back-to-back titles with the Celtics as a player/coach after taking down the Lakers again in the 1969 Finals, this time in seven games. Los Angeles won the first two games and held a 3-2 series lead, but Boston took the next two to lock up an 11th championship. Havlicek led the league in playoff minutes at 47.2 per game on his way to averaging 25.4 points, 9.9 rebounds and 5.6 assists, but he was even better in the Finals. Playing every minute in all seven games, ‘Captain John’ went for 28.3 points, 11.0 rebounds and 4.4 assists.
1974 NBA Championship
Back then, a five-year drought without an NBA title felt like an eternity in Beantown. Coach Tom Heinsohn bounced back after falling in the 1973 Eastern Conference Semifinals after compiling an absurd 68-14 record in the regular season. John Havlicek, Dave Cowens and Jo Jo White spearheaded a 4-3 series win over Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and the Milwaukee Bucks in the Finals, with Cowens exploding for 28 points and 14 boards in the 102-87 Game 7 victory. Havlicek was awarded his first and only Finals MVP by averaging 27.1 points, 6.4 rebounds, 6.0 assists and 1.3 steals in 45.1 minutes per game.
1976 NBA Championship
Heinsohn and the Celtics would take a year off before raising another championship banner. Boston defeated Alvan Adams and the Phoenix Suns in six games to wrap up their 13th NBA title. Havlicek took a step back in his age-35 season (13.2 PPG in playoffs), but Jo Jo White and Dave Cowens were ready to do all the heavy lifting. White tallied 21.7 points, 4.3 rebounds, 5.8 assists and 1.5 steals in 46.5 minutes in six Finals appearances, earning the MVP award of the series, while Cowens was unstoppable with 20.5 points and 16.3 rebounds in 42.3 minutes.
1981 NBA Championship
Bill Fitch led the Celtics to his first and only title in 25 years as a coach during the 1980-81 season. Boston split wins with the Houston Rockets in the first four games of the series before Cedric Maxwell and Larry Bird took over in Games 5 and 6 to bring home the championship. In Game 5, Finals MVP Maxwell dropped 28 points on 10-for-13 shooting with 15 rebounds in a 109-80 victory. In Game 6, Bird played 43 minutes and finished with 27 points, 13 rebounds and five assists to secure the 102-91 win and the Celtics’ 14th ring.
1984 NBA Championship
Larry Bird had his best-scoring postseason in Boston’s run to the 1984 NBA championship. In 23 games, ‘Larry Legend’ averaged 27.5 points, 11.0 rebounds, 5.9 assists, 2.3 steals and 1.2 blocks in 41.8 minutes. He shot a career-best 52.4% from the field throughout the playoffs and earned his first Finals MVP after posting 27.4 points, 14.0 rebounds, 3.6 assists, 2.1 steals and 1.1 blocks in seven games. The Celtics added another edition to their classic rivalry with the Lakers, hoisting the Larry O’Brien Trophy again thanks to a 111-102 win in Game 7.
1986 NBA Championship
Five years after Bird and the Celtics cooled off the Rockets in the 1981 Finals, Boston was back at it again to deliver the franchise’s 16th title when they beat Houston 4-2 in 1986. A 23-year-old by the name of Hakeem Olajuwon led the league in playoff scoring (537) and total rebounding (236), but it wasn’t enough to stop a deep Celtics team featuring Bird, Kevin McHale, Dennis Johnson, Danny Ainge, Robert Parish and Bill Walton. Larry Legend grabbed his second Finals MVP by putting up 25.9 points, 9.3 rebounds, 8.2 assists and 2.1 steals in six games. He led all players in the postseason with 3.1 three-point attempts while draining 41.1% from behind the arc.
2008 NBA Championship
Doc Rivers and the superstar trio of Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen were masterful in defeating Kobe Bryant and the Los Angeles Lakers in six games to claim Boston’s first title in over 20 years at the time. The Celtics outlasted the Hawks and Cavaliers in seven games during the first two rounds of the playoffs, then took down the Detroit Pistons 4-2 in the Eastern Conference Finals. Garnett was the backbone of their league-best defense (98.9 rating) as the Defensive Player of the Year in 2007-08 and was the leading scorer for the C’s with 20.4 points, 10.5 rebounds, 1.3 steals and 1.1 blocks in the postseason.
2024 NBA Championship
The 2023-24 Celtics went 64-18 in the regular season before steamrolling their way to the franchise’s 18th NBA championship with a 16-3 record in the Playoffs. Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown led Boston to the Finals where they disposed of the Dallas Mavericks in five games. Of the four series they played in the postseason last year, three ended in 4-1 victories, and they swept the Indiana Pacers 4-0 in the Eastern Conference Finals. Joe Mazzulla’s top-ranked offense (123.2) was predicated on spacing and three-point shooting, and their third-ranked defense (111.6) was every bit as menacing.
