“[The players] genuinely loved Ed,” Twiss said Monday, before the Celtics faced the Pistons. “They trusted him, which is big. Not only with caring for their injuries and listening to their war stories and complaints about being hurt, but he was very good as far as being a confidant and a really good person.”
Twiss said that Lacerte is the kind of person who would drop everything to help a friend in need, so now he and the Celtics are hoping others might do the same.
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Lacerte, who was the Celtics head trainer and physical therapist for 30 years until departing after the 2016-17 season, is battling acute monocytic leukemia and preparing for a blood stem cell transplant once in remission.
At Monday’s game, the Celtics worked to raise awareness about the National Marrow Donor Program registry, and to help find a match for Lacerte. The team wore warm-up shirts with the tagline “20 seconds could save a life” on the front and “Lacerte” on the back.
The team also set up a cheek swabbing station in the TD Garden concourse, where fans could join the blood stem cell donor registry. The station will also be set up for Friday’s game against the Heat and next Monday’s game against the Pacers. Lacerte, who was the trainer for the US men’s basketball team at the 1992 Olympics, was unable to attend the Pistons game because of his condition, but the team said he was represented by his daughter, Arianna
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The Celtics reported last week that two-way center Amari Williams suffered a hairline fracture of his right wrist. The injury sounded significant, but the rookie played for the Maine Celtics Sunday and was available for Monday’s game against the Pistons.
Williams, who has played spot minutes this season, said he’s unsure how he sustained the injury but complained of hand soreness and the fracture was revealed.
“I didn’t realize I had [a fracture], to be honest, until I did all the scanning and stuff,” he said. “But it started hurting for a few days, but I started doing recovery stuff on it and felt good to play.”
Williams said he will continue rehab on the wrist indefinitely, but was told the fracture will not heal quickly.
“It’s just something that I’m playing through,” he said. “This is the first time ever breaking a bone in my body so when it first initially happened I thought it was a sprain, tendonitis in my hand. But it doesn’t hurt [like] that, it’s just something I’m going to play through. I was anxious [about Sunday]. It was a bit shaky at first but once I got it out of my mind, I was good to go.”
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Prior to Monday’s game, the Celtics held a moment of silence for the victims of Sunday’s shooting at Brown University in which two students were killed and nine other people were injured, as well as the shooting at a Hanukkah celebration at Bondi Beach in Sydney, in which at least 15 people were killed.
The Globe’s Gary Washburn contributed to this report
Adam Himmelsbach can be reached at adam.himmelsbach@globe.com. Follow him @adamhimmelsbach.