Today in Boston Celtics history, Tom Boswell was born in Montgomery, Alabama in 1953. An alumni of South Carolina State and the South Carolina (Boswell transferred midway through his college career), Boswell was selected from the Bulldogs with the 17th overall pick of the 1975 NBA Draft.
He played for the Celtics for three seasons in total, and won a championship with the Celtics in a backup role in his rookie campaign of 1975-76. The Montgomery native left the team for the Denver Nuggets in 1978 as a free agent.
Boswell went on to play stints with that club and the Utah Jazz, as well as overseas after leaving Boston. He averaged 5.9 points, 3.9 rebounds, and an assist per game with the Celtics.
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It was also on this date that former No.1 overall pick Jim “Bad News” Barnes had his contract sold to the (then) Baltimore Bullets (now, Washington Wizards. Barnes, who’d played with the Bullets previously as well as the New York Knicks, Chicago Bulls, and Los Angeles Lakers, came to the team in 1968 when the Bulls sold his rights to the club. The Texas-El Paso alum played two seasons with the team between 1968 and 1970. He averaged 5.6 points and 4.3 rebounds per game with the team.
Finally, it is also the date that the Celtics signed former center Stojko Vrankovic to a contract in 1990. A Croatian national who went undrafted in the 1986 NBA Draft, the Drnis native would play overseas before signing with Boston. He’d never really catch on in the NBA, nor with the Celtics, averaging just 1.9 points, 1.6 rebounds, and 0.9 blocks per game with Boston.
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