Don Nelson (center) won five championships as a member of the Celtics, including with greats John Havlicek (left) and Dave Cowens.
Don Nelson (center) won five championships as a member of the Celtics, including with greats John Havlicek (left) and Dave Cowens.
The wider basketball community is honoring the coaching legacy of the late Don Nelson, and there is nothing wrong with that. He retired from coaching with 1,335 victories and a deserved place in the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame.
But none of this had anything to do with the Celtics, and that is what’s on my mind when I think of No.19, Don Nelson, who died Sunday at the age of 86.
To continue reading, please login or subscribe to Globe.com
Let me present a common Celtics scenario. A onetime 15-point lead has dwindled to 4, and Tommy Heinsohn calls time out. When the huddle breaks they run a play, not for Dave Cowens, not for Jo Jo White, or even for John Havlicek. No, they run a play for their most reliable midrange shooter, and that is Don Nelson. I’m not making this up. That’s how they operated.
Nelson was 6 feet 6 inches and the personification of the midrange shooter. It was a highly valued skill in those pre-three days. It’s safe to say that 80-85 percent of his 4,602 career regular-season plus playoff field goals were 15-17-foot jump shots, the rest being a rare fast-break layup or much more frequent putback.
Get Starting Point
A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday.
Enter Email
Sign Up
He was slow. He would have been the first to tell you that. But he occupied a very important part of Boston’s beautifully orchestrated fast break as the “trailer.” If the layup didn’t readily materialize for the middle man, be it Havlicek or White, Nellie would ambling down, ready to receive a pass and ready to drill a jumper. It was a nice way to earn a living.
Nelson was a 48 percent career regular-season shooter. He Nelson was a 50 percent career playoff shooter.
Nelson once went 10 for 10 in a playoff game against the Buffalo Braves. And check this out: Don Nelson, age 34 going on 35, led the league in field goal percentage, shooting .539 from the floor, the preponderance of them, as I’ve said, being foul-line jumpers. He was both the oldest and shortest player to do so. I trust you get the point.
Nellie had somewhat limited physical gifts. Teammate Paul Westphal once summarized his credentials. “Nellie will be fine as long as he has a wrist and a brain,” joked No. 44.
Good Celtics fans think of him for just one of those 4,602 baskets, and there’s nothing wrong with that, either. It was Game 7 against the Lakers in 1969. The Celtics led by a point when LA’s Keith Erickson poked the ball away from Havlicek. The ball went straight to Nelson, who was perched at the foul line. What always strikes me during the countless times I’ve watched it is how Nellie gathers the ball coming to him from his right and without a millisecond of hesitation smoothly rises for the shot. It was if he had said, “Thanks, Keith.”
Everyone who cares can tell you what happens next. The shot hits the back rim, and rises several feet in the air. Some Celtics lore has it rising 10 feet, 20 feet, the Forum ceiling, to Neptune, etc.
However high it went, it was up there, all right. The important thing is that it came straight down through the cords, and it provided the cushion that guaranteed championship No. 11.
An absolute giant.
And a basketball life that seemed to touch every player and coach who’s impacted the league for generations.
Including a Celtics-Lakers NBA Finals Game 7 shot that seemed to touch the sky before falling into history.
RIP, Nellie. pic.twitter.com/mnpvtky1eK
— Sean Grande (@SeanGrandePBP) August 9, 2026
Nelson had an interesting path to having his number raised to the Garden rafters. He was a 1962 draft choice of the expansion Chicago Zephyrs (who have morphed into today’s Washington Wizards), who after one lackluster year sold him to the Lakers, for whom he averaged 5.2 points a game in 1963-64. And 2.4 per in 39 games the following season.
He was on the floor for the Lakers as the Celtics famously opened the fourth quarter of the clinching 1965 Game 5 with 20 straight points. A year later, he was picking up a ring as a member of the champion Celtics.
For Red Auerbach, on the advice of Heinsohn, who said he didn’t like playing against Nelson, had picked him up for — honest to God — $1,000.
Thus began a Celtics career that would span 872 games, five championship rings, and a No. 19 being retired. And if you want to talk about being reliable, Nelson played all 82 games as a Celtic six times. No load you-know-what for him.
Oops, almost forgot about his unique “shot put” free throw form. It worked for him. Nellie was always able to figure things out. Remember what Westphal said.