On this day in Boston Celtics history, the team took two players of note in the 1985 NBA draft that was held in the Felt Forum in New York. With their first selection (No. 20), the Celtics took 6-foot-2, 185-pound point guard Samuel Vincent out of Michigan State.
A native of Lansing Michigan, Vincent played two seasons for Boston (1985- 1987), winning a championship with the Celtics in 1986 as a reserve guard. The former Spartan averaged 3.4 points and 1.2 rebounds per game per 7.8 minutes of play per game over the two seasons he was with the team.
Vincent left Boston when he was dealt with Scott Wedman to the Seattle SuperSonics for draft considerations in 1987.
The Celtics also took 6-foot-6 shooting guard Ralph Lewis out of La Salle University with the 139th pick (there were many more rounds in that era).
Lewis played in the Continental Basketball Association and United States Basketball League after his selection, and he ended up signing with the Detroit Pistons.
It is also the anniversary of the trade that sent point guard Kemba Walker to the Oklahoma City Thunder to bring old friend Al Horford back to the Celtics for the second stint of his career, along with big man Moses Brown.
Brown of course was not long for the team. He was traded away in another deal that offseason for Josh Richardson, but the deal has been widely credited with helping propel the Celtics to the 2022 NBA Finals the following season.
Pour leur saison inaugurale en 1946-47, les Celtics de Boston portaient des maillots à manches ! Le numéro 12, Art Spector, aurait eu 101 ans aujourd’hui et était surnommé «Speed» pour ses qualités évidentes de vitesse. Son petit fils Jonathan a été joueur international en soccer pic.twitter.com/2a8I9C30Ha
— Vincent Reculeau “Baby T.E.R.” (@WonderfulOhYeah) October 17, 2021
Finally, it is also the day that we lost Art Spector in 1987. An alumnus of his hometown Villanova, the Philadelphia native was a member of the Celtics roster in their first season of play in the then-Basketball Association of America (BAA — a predecessor of the NBA).
Spector was an early Celtics stalwart, playing 169 games over four seasons in the early days of the league. He averaged 5 points per game over that stretch — rest in peace.
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