Cowens' rebound

http://bostonherald.com/sports/celtics_nba/nba_coverage/2013/10/cowens_rebound



Cowens’ rebound
Celtics icon relates to Pierce dynamics





Sunday, October 27, 2013
By:  Mark Murphy


Paul Pierce will start his 16th NBA season this week in a place he never would have imagined — on another team, the Brooklyn Nets.

The experience has clearly left the former Celtics captain with a bittersweet feeling, though his renewed chance at a second NBA title considered, dismay counts for only so much.

Celtics legend Dave Cowens sees nothing wrong here, because the Hall of Famer had a similar experience. He played his last game in the Garden as a Milwaukee Buck during the 1982-83 season, when he came out of retirement two years after the Celtics raised No. 18 to the rafters.

There’s a strong parallel. Pierce was part of a major trade, the chief reward of which was four first-round draft picks. Cowens gave Red Auerbach the means to trade for Quinn Buckner, a member of the Celtics’ 1984 championship team.

Far be it from Cowens, now a CSNNE analyst, to question good business.

“It doesn’t bother me in terms of what he’s done and gone through,” Cowens said of Pierce. “He’s been compensated well. I know Paul was a very loyal guy who decided he liked his experience here. He had opportunities to go somewhere else. I’m sure he didn’t want to go, but he understands the business. He understood Danny (Ainge’s) reasons.”

Ainge’s reasons were similar to those of Auerbach in the summer of 1982, though his Celtics were then busy parlaying their 1981 title into two more.

Cowens had retired following the 1979-80 season, and spent two years as the athletic director at Regis College. He stayed retired long enough to lose the aches and pains from a long career of hard playing, and decided to attempt a comeback.

He approached Auerbach, who still held Cowens’ rights, and stood to gain something from trading those rights. Cowens was realistic. Though the NBA would forever regard him as a Celtic, he knew another team was probably in his future.

“I told Red that he could send me some place where he could get a good deal for me,” Cowens said.

Auerbach was on the verge of accepting a first-round draft pick from Phoenix — Cowens recalls that he was ready to board an airplane — when Milwaukee’s Don Nelson expressed an interest in his former teammate.

“Nellie had come in with Bob Lanier to look at me work out at Regis College, and I guess they liked what they saw,” said Cowens, who only played 40 games for the Bucks, before a torn quadriceps tendon truncated his season.

“It just kept getting worse and worse,” he said, “until I jumped one day and it tore completely.”

The irony? That Bucks team, with Cowens sidelined, swept the Celtics in the 1983 conference semifinals, before losing to eventual champ Philadelphia in the conference finals.

“I could have helped them,” said Cowens, who retired after having three surgeries that summer, including two to combat a recurring staph infection.

But the most unusual part of that season, naturally, was Cowens’ return to the Garden, where his number was still retired.

“I’m probably one of the few players who came back and played under their retired number,” he said. “But I had a good feeling about going back and playing there. They had got Quinn Buckner for me. You go into the place and you know everybody — the ushers, the ticket takers, the fans you played for, there’s a bond that lasts forever.”

“But going back is always unusual because you know things aren’t quite the same. You know the fans will accept you, though, and I’m sure Paul will feel the same way.”

Even if Pierce always thought he would retire as a Celtic. Cowens was never that sure.

“I never really thought about it,” he said with a laugh. “I was never really into long-term planning like that.”

This week’s C’s timeline



Wednesday, 7 p.m. at Toronto — After two preseason losses to the Raptors, including one in Toronto, the Celtics may be a little ambivalent about reaching for their passports once again this week. But this is the Canadian outpost the NBA has selected for the Celtics in their 2013-14 season-opener, and it’s a far cry from those recent glamour openings against teams such as the Heat and Knicks. As first-year coach Brad Stevens noted of the Raptors, they have a much better defined starting lineup than the rebuilding Celtics. But those lineup experiments start to count, right here.

Friday, 7:30 p.m. vs. Milwaukee — A brutal November schedule, with 19 games and six back-to-back swings, each of which finish on the road, starts here against a relatively mild opponent that lost its two primary scorers in the offseason. But the Bucks have what promises to hurt the undersized Celtics most this season — plenty of rebounding power.

A GREAT COVER-UP PLAN BY DOC

Celtics Nation may not share in Doc Rivers’ new anticipated glory with the Clippers, but the coach scored a hit for all of them with his decree that every Lakers banners be covered during Clippers home games in the Staples Center.

From Kevin Garnett telling LeBron James to mind his own business to Rivers’ shot across the Lakers bow, the Celtics’ departed are providing lots of preseason entertainment. Reggie Miller is a big fan of Rivers’ bravado.

“I love it! It’s about time,” the TNT announcer said during a conference call last week. “You cannot tell me that any Clippers coaches before has not thought about that and gone to management and actually said something. It took Doc Rivers to come in here. You play in the same building, how could you not cover them up? I think it’s a brilliant move. You are telling your team: ‘We’re taking over LA, and we respect the banners . . . but this is our time.”

Above all, Miller believes that Rivers already has changed that historically miserable Clippers culture.

“For us to be talking about the Clippers as if they are the Lakers in the second coming is astonishing,” he said. “Right now it is Clipper Nation in Los Angeles. Without Kobe (Bryant) starting the season and not knowing when he’s going to be back, there is a lot of people jumping off the Laker bandwagon and getting on the Clippers bandwagon. I think (the Lakers) will be competitive, I don’t think they make the playoffs. But it will be interesting with all the changes for the Clippers to see if this team is ready to take the next step. For them to take the next step they have to compete for a championship. The Lakers pride themselves on championships. It’s all about those banners. That’s what separates the two. It’s about the mindset. I think Doc Rivers is bringing that championship mindset to a team that has underachieved for the last 20 or 30 years. We’ll see when the bright lights are on and you have to go out and beat the Spurs, Thunder and Warriors on a nightly basis, let’s see if this team can bring it like we know the Lakers have.”



bob



.

Pierce gave the C's a lot, so I think he'll always be revered. KG, too.

I still think Doc has a few screws loose.

Clipper bandwagon... amusing. I can't see Laker fans wanting to become Clippers fans. That's just stupid.


KJ

Celtics legend Dave Cowens sees nothing wrong here, because the Hall of Famer had a similar experience. He played his last game in the Garden as a Milwaukee Buck during the 1982-83 season, when he came out of retirement two years after the Celtics raised No. 18 to the rafters.


Bob

did I miss something?

When did #18 happen?

beat

beat wrote:Celtics legend Dave Cowens sees nothing wrong here, because the Hall of Famer had a similar experience. He played his last game in the Garden as a Milwaukee Buck during the 1982-83 season, when he came out of retirement two years after the Celtics raised No. 18 to the rafters.


Bob

did I miss something?

When did #18 happen?

beat

beat,

I think they were talking about Cowen's #18, not Championship Banner #18.


bob


.

bobheckler wrote:

beat wrote:Celtics legend Dave Cowens sees nothing wrong here, because the Hall of Famer had a similar experience. He played his last game in the Garden as a Milwaukee Buck during the 1982-83 season, when he came out of retirement two years after the Celtics raised No. 18 to the rafters.


Bob

did I miss something?

When did #18 happen?

beat

beat,

I think they were talking about Cowen's #18, not Championship Banner #18.


bob


.

OK I give..... planes are taking off low today.

beat