 Russell and Walton have a combined 13 championship rings. (Joe Murphy, Steve Freeman/NBAE/Getty Images) |
Here's what they had to say in response to the questions you sent in via The Finals Blog prior to the start of Game 2.
BILL RUSSELL
Q: Mr.Russell, which team do you think is going to win the 2003-2004 NBA finals? Why? (Syed, Albany, N.Y.)
Russell: “I haven’t the slightest idea, and I don’t know why.”
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Bill Russell goes for a layup against the 76ers during the 1970 season. NBAE/Getty Images |
Russell: “When I made the junior varsity in high school. That was the beginning, and the rest can never pass that.”
Q: What do you think about Phil Jackson's chance of passing Red Auerbach as the coach with the most NBA Championships? (Holdren, Boston, Ma.)
Russell: “He has a very good chance, because if he doesn’t get it this year, he’ll probably get it next year. I think it’s quite a remarkable achievement, but I don’t think it diminishes Red’s accomplishment in any way.”
Q: If you coud pick a starting lineup with any NBA players of your choice, who would be on it? (Matt, Hamilton, Canada)
Russell: “I don’t know how to do that.”
Q: Any one player you’d definitely want to have?
Russell: “Just me and then go from there.”
Q: Hey Bill, what former Celtics teammate were you closest with on the team? (David, LaGrange, Ill.)
Russell: “Well, K.C. Jones was my roommate in college, but I have very, very close relationships with about half a dozen of the guys. We talk on a regular basis. I mean, we don’t go months, we go days between conversations, and that’s (John) Havlicek, Sam (Jones), (Tom) Heinsohn, K.C. (Jones), Satch (Tom Sanders) – all those guys, we talk all the time.”
Q: As a Celtic, what’s it like coming here to a Lakers game? (Bill Walton’s wife, Lori)
Russell: “We beat the Lakers in The Finals six straight times, so I love coming here. In fact, my last game was at The Forum. We beat the Lakers in my last game.”
BILL WALTON
Q: Bill, are you rooting for anyone in this series? (Jerry, Omaha)
Walton: “Well, I want what’s best for my son. I was in Boston last week and I was speaking on behalf of K.C. Jones, and all my Celtics friends back there in Boston, they predicted a Detroit sweep, so they’re looking pretty good right now. But what I hope is for great basketball, incredible drama and the ball in the air at the buzzer of the second overtime to decide the fate of western civilization.”
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Bill Walton looks on during a game. Rick Stewart/NBAE/Getty Images |
Walton: “I like the fast-break game, I like the constant attack, I like the up-and-down game, and I think it’s frustrating at times but it’s really emblematic of the entire league. These are the two best teams, but they are not running teams. The Lakers are a much older team. Detroit, if they’re going to win this series, is going to have to run. I don’t think they can win a stand-around, slug-it-out game. I would like to see a greater commitment to running. I’d like to see less looking over at the sidelines for direction from the coaching staffs during the course of the game – that should all take place during the practices and during the time outs. And then that relentless attack where whoever has the ball is just on the go, that’s what I live for. I love the fast-break game. Growing up in Southern California, there was the Lakers with Chick Hearn, Jerry West and Elgin Baylor, and then John Wooden and UCLA basketball – that’s how I learned how to play. And then with being such a fan of the Celtics with Bill Russell, my favorite player of all time who just walked into the room here, and the fact that he used to key the fastbreak just time and time again. A set offense is important and you have to be able to play a set offense to win the championship, but to me, the most appealing style is the fast-break game.”
Q: What was it like to go down 0-2 in the 1977 Finals and then come back to win the title? (Rich, Vancouver, Canada)
Walton: “We were the youngest team in the history of the NBA to ever win the championship. Johnny Davis was 20 years old, a rookie, Lionel Hollins and Bob Gross were both 22 and second-year players. I was 23 and Maurice Lucas was 24. And while we were down, we never lost our confidence. We never lost the belief in ourselves that we could get it done. Nobody else had any belief that we would win, but the key factors that enabled us to win were Jack Ramsay’s brilliance, confidence, poise, his ability to steady us and not make us think that we had to do anything different. He called us together and said, look, the other team is trash-talking, Dr. J is saying they know our plays better than we know them and that this series is over. [Ramsay] told us that we have just begun to start playing, we haven’t found our game yet, what we need to do is not change our strategy, not come up with new plays, but revert to our core, fundamental strengths, which is fast-break game, pressure defense, the team game with great ball movement. And then we came together around the leadership and the commitment to the team from the greatest teammate that I ever had, Maurice Lucas, who with his willingness to stand up to the biggest, baddest bully of them all, Darryl Dawkins and defend the honor, integrity and pride of the Portland Trail Blazers, besides truth, justice and what’s right for America, the Trail Blazers were able to ride the emotional wave and crest of the Blazermaniacs who would never let us die. And it was such a special time – that 18 months in Portland when we were the best team in basketball, that was where I played the best basketball that I ever played in my life. I could never thank those people up in Oregon, I could never thank Jack and all the guys on the team, particularly Maurice Lucas, for making it all happen for me. I just wish it had lasted forever.”
Q: Do you have one favorite moment from The Finals – either from playing or watching it? (Doug, New York)
Walton: “I have been watching The NBA Finals since I was just a young kid in San Diego, and my life has been built around it. I’d go every year, either as a participant, as a broadcaster, now as a fan and as a Dad, and there’s nothing like it on earth. And all the great teams, all the great players, really the history of my life is written right here at these NBA Finals. And to see Bill Russell and to be able to sit with him at the games and to hear all the stories about the incredible seven-game battles that they would have against (St. Louis') Bob Pettit and then the Lakers, and then the seventh game in ’69, Bill Russell’s last game, here in Los Angeles where they had the piece of paper, the handout from Jack Kent Cooke, the memo to instruct everybody how to conduct the celebration at the end, and Sam Jones brought it into the lockerroom and Bill Russell read out loud to all the team how the other team was going to be celebrating because they had already just figured that the championship was theirs… Willis Reed’s seventh-game entrance into Madison Square Garden, Kareem’s first NBA championship, the great Laker team with the 69 victories in ’72, and one of my favorite teams, the ’74 and ’76 Celtic championship team, Rick Barry’s team, and it was all so special, Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, Michael Jordan, the list is endless, it just keeps going on, Tim Duncan, Shaquille O’Neal, Hakeem Olajuwon – I mean, whoever played better than that? That’s what makes it so special. And to be able to still be a part of it, I mean it’s been 18 years since I was able to play basketball, yet I still get more excited than ever. And coming in today, we had our pregame meal, we had the good rest, coming in thinking, getting all my thoughts together and then just as we’re coming in to STAPLES Center here, to get a call from our son, Luke Walton and say ‘Dad, we’re in the championships, we’re playing in The NBA Finals.’ What could be better than that? I am, indeed the luckiest guy in the world.”
