The NBA Finals teams are set! Congrats to the Golden State Warriors and the Boston Celtics, who won the Western and Eastern Conference titles, respectively.
This year, the NBA renamed its conference championship trophies. The Warriors won the Oscar Robertson trophy, while the Celtics won the Bob Cousy hardware. How fun.
You might hear some stats thrown around over the coming weeks, like how the Warriors are just the fourth franchise to make the NBA Finals at least six times in an eight-year span or that the Celtics have a chance to win the most titles of any franchise in the league.
But we don’t care about any of that here. We just want the ridiculous franchise facts. Let’s go!
The Warriors used to be based in Philadelphia and had quite the offensive mascot.
The Celtics have played 18 games in these playoffs but haven’t lost two in a row.
Golden State’s Klay Thompson is a huge Harry Potter nerd. Here he is geeking out over The Wizarding World of Harry Potter in Orlando and dressing up in a robe while in high school.
The Celtics are the NBA’s only team to play on an oak floor.
Steph Curry’s mom reportedly used to fine him $100 every time he had three or more turnovers in a game. Now, she sends him a text (that probably reads like “I’m not mad, just disappointed”), which he says is equally as bad.
Boston’s Bill Russell won 11 NBA Finals but never won an NBA Finals MVP award. You know why? The award didn’t exist while he was playing. Loopholes, baby!
The San Francisco Warriors used to play in the Cow Palace (what a great name for an arena). They eventually switched stadiums but had to move back to the Cow Palace during the 1975 Finals because of an Ice Follies show in their normal arena. Let’s get a basketball game on ice next year.
Some of the other team names that could have been used instead of the Celtics: Whirlwinds, Olympians, and Unicorns. I’m picturing a unicorn puncturing the ball with its horn and that is a delightful image.
Wilt Chamberlain is the only Rookie of the Year to lead the league in scoring. When he was a rookie in the 1959-60 season with the Philadelphia Warriors, he posted AVERAGES of 37.6 points and 27 rebounds per game, which I believe is the same number of rebounds I had my entire freshman year of high school.
Kevin Garnett wore a pair of shoes that had his face on them.
The NBA Finals tip off on Thursday. Happy basketball!
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