Celtics Destroy Lakers in NBA Finals Opener

Apr. 18, 1965 - A jolly band of green giants from Boston Garden treated 10,180 of their most faithful to a festive Easter afternoon.

Although unaccustomed to seeing empty seats in the house at this stage of the season, the Celtics decided to join in the holiday spirit by dunking the Lakers, 142-110.

In victory, the Celtics moved ahead in this best-of-seven series for the NBA championship, 1-0.

The second game will be in the Garden tomorrow night. And without Easter and free baseball on T.V. to compete with, that game is already a sellout.

The Celtics, playing it free and loose, toyed with the Lakers today. With Wilt Chamberlain sitting courtside as a T.V. commentator instead of an opponent, the Celtics racked up 142 points — a record for a championship game.

Jerry West, the Laker great who averaged 43.6 points per game in the Western Division finals against the Bullets, was firing blanks in this one.

Jerry scored just six points in the first half with K.C. Jones playing him nose to nose, and the Lakers never did click.

With no one to match Bill Russell, the Laker cause appeared hopeless. L.A. coach Fred Schaus tried four men against Russell in 38 minutes — Gene Wiley, Leroy Ellis, Darrell Imhoff, and Bill McGill. Russell made sandpiles out of all of them by snatching 28 rebounds — more than any three of his rivals put together.

Thus, with K.C. keeping the ball from West and Russell bossing the boards, the Celtics had a nice, comfortable afternoon.

“With Elgin [Baylor] out,” said Schaus, who didn’t appear to be too upset by the atrocious Laker performance, “we depend so much on Jerry. When he wasn’t hitting, the other guys started to press and took shots they shouldn’t.

“K.C., of course, was largely responsible for Jerry having so much trouble, but after the way he played to beat Baltimore, it figured he’d have a bad one. 

“You can bet we’ll be ready tomorrow night. We’re too good a ballclub to lose like this.”

Red Auerbach seemed surprised by the outcome.

“I don’t know how we blew them out of it so quickly,” he said. “But it doesn’t mean anything unless they’ll give us those 20 points to start with tomorrow night. 

“Actually, we hit, and they didn’t. That’s the story. I would have to single out K.C. and Havlicek as the top players for us.”

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