Bill Russell

Regarded as one of the greatest players ever, Russell won 11 championships with the Boston Celtics.

In 2009, the MVP trophy of the NBA Finals was named in his honour. Celtics coach and general manager Red Auerbach so coveted Russell that he worked out a trade with the St. Louis Hawks for the second pick in the draft. Bill was the ultimate winner and consummate teammate, and his influence on the NBA will be felt forever. From my first moment of being alive was the notion that my mother and father loved me.” It was Russell’s mother who would tell him to disregard comments from those who might see him playing in the yard. The Celtics won it all again in 1959, starting an unprecedented string of eight consecutive NBA crowns. The Celtics also picked up Tommy Heinsohn and K.C. Jones, Russell’s college teammate, in the same draft. At the height of his athletic career, Bill advocated vigorously for civil rights and social justice, a legacy he passed down to generations of NBA players who followed in his footsteps," Silver said. “Bill Russell, the man, is someone who stood up for the rights and dignity of all men,” Obama said at the ceremony. He was at the March on Washington in 1963, when Martin Luther King Jr. gave his “I Have a Dream” speech, and he backed Muhammad Ali when the boxer was pilloried for refusing induction into the military draft. Often, that meant Wilt Chamberlain, the only player of the era who was a worthy rival for Russell. A Hall of Famer, five-time Most Valuable Player and 12-time All-Star, Russell in 1980 was voted the greatest player in the NBA history by basketball writers. Perhaps you'll relive one or two of the golden moments he gave us, or recall his trademark laugh as he delighted in explaining the real story behind how those moments unfolded," the family statement said.

Former Boston Celtics star Bill Russell, one of the sports world's greatest winners as the anchor of a team that won 11 NBA championships, has died at the ...

When the Celtics retired his No. 6, Russell's love of privacy and belief in the team concept led him to demand a private ceremony with coaches and team mates in an otherwise empty arena. In 2011, President Barack Obama cited Russell's dedication to mentoring when he awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom, which Russell called the second greatest personal honor of his life. Russell became semi-reclusive after his coaching career, saying, "I wanted to be forgotten." It was in Oakland that Russell's career as a winner began. Yet the fierce rivals were friends off the court, often dining at each other's homes. Chamberlain compiled the record-breaking personal statistics but Russell ended up with more championship rings than fingers. He was the player-coach on two of those championship teams. Russell averaged 15.1 points and 22.5 rebounds per game for his career. The Russell-era Celtics teams were rich in talent. He refused to sign autographs, saying he preferred to have conversations. He also had what team mate Tom Heinsohn called "a neurotic need to win". He had a baleful glare but also a delightful cackling laugh.

The most prolific winner in the competition's history, the Boston Celtics great marched with Martin Luther King Jr, supported Muhammad Ali and received the ...

“Bill was the ultimate winner and consummate team-mate, and his influence on the NBA will be felt forever,” Silver added. In 2009, the MVP trophy of the NBA Finals was named in his honour – even though Russell never won himself, because it wasn’t awarded for the first time until 1969. In 2013, a statue was unveiled on Boston’s City Hall Plaza of Russell surrounded by blocks of granite with quotes on leadership and character. “He marched with King; he stood by Ali. When a restaurant refused to serve the Black Celtics, he refused to play in the scheduled game. Celtics coach and general manager Red Auerbach so coveted Russell that he worked out a trade with the St Louis Hawks for the second pick in the draft. He was at the March on Washington in 1963, when King gave his “I Have a Dream” speech, and he backed Muhammad Ali when the boxer was pilloried for refusing induction into the military draft. Russell’s No 6 jersey was retired by the Celtics in 1972. The Celtics won it all again in 1959, starting an unprecedented string of eight consecutive NBA crowns. At the height of his athletic career, Bill advocated vigorously for civil rights and social justice, a legacy he passed down to generations of NBA players who followed in his footsteps," Silver said. The Celtics also picked up Tommy Heinsohn and KC Jones, Russell’s college team-mate, in the same draft. Often, that meant Wilt Chamberlain, the only worthy rival of Russell’s era and his prime competition for rebounds, MVP trophies and barroom arguments about who was better. “Bill's wife, Jeannine, and his many friends and family thank you for keeping Bill in your prayers.

Celtics legend and 11-time NBA Champion Bill Russell died 'peacefully' at the age of 88, his family confirmed Sunday.

“To me, one of the most beautiful things to see is a group of men coordinating their efforts toward a common goal, alternately subordinating and asserting themselves to achieve real teamwork in action,” Russell once wrote. The Celtics exacted revenge on the 76ers the following season, winning the division finals 4-3 before defeating the Lakers 4-2 for Russell’s first championship as a player-coach. Those qualities would serve Russell in 1966 when Auerbach retired to focus on responsibilities as a general manager. I got to succeed or fail on this job not as a Black man or a white man or a green man, but as a coach. But there’s another type who makes the players around him look better than they are, and that’s the type Russell was.” He averaged at least 23 rebounds per game for seven straight seasons with a team-first acumen, all while helping to revolutionize the game on the defensive end. Boston took full advantage, often funneling opponents toward Russell. That, in turn, allowed the Celtics to play more aggressively on the perimeter. A dominant shot blocker, Russell was named the NBA’s Most Valuable Player five times, in addition to earning All-Star recognition on 12 occasions in his 13-year career. Russell attended McClymonds High School in Oakland, where he was awkward and struggled to find playing time until his senior year. There, he paired up with future Celtics teammate K.C. Jones to lead San Francisco to 56 consecutive wins and NCAA championships in 1955 and 1956. Russell racked up 21,620 career rebounds (22.5 per game), which ranks second only to Chamberlain’s career mark, and was a four-time season rebounding leader. “And we hope each of us can find a new way to act or speak up with Bill’s uncompromising, dignified and always constructive commitment to principle.

Known as the winningest NBA player of all time, Bill Russell also blazed trails as a civil rights advocate.

Regarded as a recluse for much of his post-retirement years, Russell did occasionally take to social media in the final stages of his life, posting about basketball and his travels. In 2009, the NBA renamed the Finals Most Valuable Player award the “Bill Russell Award,” a fitting honor for a man who went 21-0 in winner-take-all games between his collegiate, Olympic and professional careers. Russell boycotted an exhibition game in 1961 in Lexington, Kentucky after two of his teammates were denied service in a coffee shop and was a highly visible member of the Black Power movement. Even as the Vietnam War and other off-court issues compromised his attention during his last season, Russell went out on top in his final campaign, combining with John Havlicek to lead the Celtics to a seven-game NBA Finals victory over the Lakers. Russell had 26 rebounds in his last professional game, a 108-106 road victory that cemented Boston as the first team to win the NBA Finals after losing the first two games. Bitter feelings over his treatment in Boston led Russell to forgo attending his own jersey retirement in 1972 and Hall of Fame induction in 1975. The 1966 series, also against the Lakers, required seven games, and he willed the Celtics to a 95-93 victory with 25 points and a game-high 32 rebounds.

Bill Russell redefined how basketball is played, and then he changed the way sports are viewed in a racially divided country.

In 2009, the MVP trophy of the NBA Finals was named in his honour. In 2013, a statue was unveiled on Boston's City Hall Plaza of Russell surrounded by blocks of granite with quotes on leadership and character. Celtics coach and general manager Red Auerbach so coveted Russell that he worked out a trade with the St Louis Hawks for the second pick in the draft. But it was Jackie Robinson who gave Russell a road map for dealing with racism in his sport: "Jackie was a hero to us. He was at the March on Washington in 1963, when King gave his "I Have a Dream" speech, and he backed Ali when the boxer was pilloried for refusing induction into the military draft. "She hung the phone up and I asked myself, 'How do you get to be a hero to Jackie Robinson?'" Russell said. "Bill Russell was the greatest champion in all of team sports," NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said. A Hall of Famer, five-time Most Valuable Player and 12-time All-Star, Russell in 1980 was voted the greatest player in NBA history by basketball writers. It was Russell's mother who would tell him to disregard comments from those who might see him playing in the yard. No cause of death was immediately available; Russell, who had been living in the Seattle area, was not well enough to present the NBA Finals MVP trophy in June due to a long illness. Often, that meant Wilt Chamberlain, the only worthy rival of Russell's era and his prime competition for rebounds, MVP trophies and barroom arguments about who was better. "We hope each of us can find a new way to act or speak up with Bill's uncompromising, dignified and always constructive commitment to principle," the family said.

The game of basketball suffered a significant loss on Sunday morning, when it was announced that NBA legend and pioneer Bill Russell had passed away at the ...

Sharing a picture with Bill Russell that came after his first championship in 2015, Steph Curry was able to reflect on what the trailblazer and icon meant to him and the game of basketball. Acknowledging Russell's impact on both basketball ad the world around it, Steph shared his appreciation for an unparalleled legacy. The game of basketball suffered a significant loss on Sunday morning, when it was announced that NBA legend and pioneer Bill Russell had passed away at the age of 88.

One of basketball's great players has died. Bill Russell was a star with the Boston Celtics and won the most titles of any NBA player: 11.

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Boston Celtics legend Bill Russell was a civil rights trailblazer, before, during and after his basketball career. He was awarded the Presidential Medal of ...

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NBA legend Bill Russell, an 11-time NBA champion with the Boston Celtics and the first Black head coach in the league, passed away "peacefully" Sunday, ...

At the height of his athletic career, Bill advocated vigorously for civil rights and social justice, a legacy he passed down to generations of NBA players who followed in his footsteps. "The countless accolades that he earned for his storied career with the Boston Celtics -- including a record 11 championships and five MVP awards -- only begin to tell the story of Bill's immense impact on our league and broader society. As tall as Bill Russell stood, his legacy rises far higher -- both as a player and as a person. Our thoughts are with his family as we mourn his passing and celebrate his enormous legacy in basketball, Boston, and beyond." "Along the way, Bill earned a string of individual awards that stands unprecedented as it went unmentioned by him. "It is with a very heavy heart we would like to pass along to all of Bill's friends, fans, & followers," the statement reads.

Bill Russell, the NBA great who anchored a Boston Celtics dynasty that won 11 championships in 13 years died on Sunday. He was 88.

In 2009, the MVP trophy of the NBA Finals was named in his honor. In 2013, a statue was unveiled on Boston's City Hall Plaza of Russell surrounded by blocks of granite with quotes on leadership and character. Bill was the ultimate winner and consummate teammate, and his influence on the NBA will be felt forever. Celtics coach and general manager Red Auerbach so coveted Russell that he worked out a trade with the St. Louis Hawks for the second pick in the draft. But it was Jackie Robinson who gave Russell a road map for dealing with racism in his sport: "Jackie was a hero to us. "She hung the phone up and I asked myself, 'How do you get to be a hero to Jackie Robinson?'" Russell said. The Celtics won it all again in 1959, starting an unprecedented string of eight consecutive NBA crowns. He endured insults and vandalism, but he kept on focusing on making the teammates who he loved better players and made possible the success of so many who would follow." The native of Louisiana also left a lasting mark as a Black athlete in a city — and country — where race is often a flash point. It was Russell's mother who would tell him to disregard comments from those who might see him playing in the yard. Often, that meant Wilt Chamberlain, the only player of the era who was a worthy rival for Russell. At the height of his athletic career, Bill advocated vigorously for civil rights and social justice, a legacy he passed down to generations of NBA players who followed in his footsteps," Silver said.

Bill Russell, the NBA great who anchored a Boston Celtics dynasty that won 11 championships in 13 years — the last two as the first Black head coach in any ...

Thank you for all you did for us and this game. This is a teary-eyed Sunday knowing that we lost a legendary human being@RealBillRussellHis dedication to civil-rights, human-rights and the sport of basketball puts him beyond legendary status. Thank you for everything you have given to the game and all of us. My condolences and prayers to his family.pic.twitter.com/v2aHm5x4yt Was an absolute honor to spend time with#BillRussell. He was a walking encyclopedia. The ultimate leader and just happened to be one of the best hoopers ever! Thank you, Bill, for leading the way and giving us such a high bar to shoot at. My friend. My hero. RIP to an all-time winner, teammate and person. May he Rest in Power. Bill Russell was an inspiration to me in so many ways.

So many in the NBA community are paying tribute to the extraordinary life Russell led.

My condolences and prayers to his family.— Harrison Barnes (@hbarnes) pic.twitter.com/v2aHm5x4yt July 31, 2022 Thank you, Bill, for leading the way and giving us such a high bar to shoot at.— David Robinson (@DavidtheAdmiral) July 31, 2022 (3/4)— Boston Celtics (@celtics) July 31, 2022 I will forever remember his cackling laugh, sense of humor and love for the game of basketball.— Earvin Magic Johnson (@MagicJohnson) pic.twitter.com/tLaK2gjlGa July 31, 2022 Since the day we met, he mentored me and shared advice.— Earvin Magic Johnson (@MagicJohnson) July 31, 2022 This is a teary-eyed Sunday knowing that we lost a legendary human being— Robert Horry (@RKHorry) @RealBillRussellHis dedication to civil-rights, human-rights and the sport of basketball puts him beyond legendary status. Over the course of our friendship, he always reminded me about making things better in the Black community.— Earvin Magic Johnson (@MagicJohnson) pic.twitter.com/K73adpaWZ4 July 31, 2022 He handled every adversity with dignity and grace, and walked away a champion. I looked up to him on the court and off. His success on the court was undeniable; he was dominate and great, winning 11 NBA championships. This is a loss being felt deeply across the world, particularly among current and former Celtics and the NBA community at large. Russell won an NBA record 11 NBA championships, including eight straight, over a 13-year career with the Boston Celtics -- the final two of which he served as Boston's head coach in addition to playing.

Russell's basketball legacy is beyond well-known. Yet reviewing his jaw-dropping accomplishments never gets old.

It's a tale as old as congressional reapportionment — an incumbent must court new voters after the decennial shifting of district lines. The big picture: It would be a disservice to remember Russell as only a basketball player. - He sat just feet away for Martin Luther King Jr. during his “I Have A Dream” speech. You painted a masterpiece, Bill. 49 in two others. 51 in one game.

Basketball fans, athletes and elected leaders are mourning the death of Celtics great Bill Russell. The NBA legend and civil rights advocate died Sunday at ...

"He was the best." "My dad used to talk about him as just, the guy, how he was just this incredible player, and there was nobody like him," he said. Boston Mayor Michelle Wu said she was devastated by the news. Gov. Charlie Baker called Russell the greatest of all time, as someone who broke barriers in both "the game of basketball and the game of life for Black athletes and Americans." "He put up with a lot in Boston, and he just kept on winning, kept on working at it, dedicated to the sport, just a good person," he said. "To be the greatest champion in your sport, to revolutionize the way the game is played, and to be a societal leader all at once seems unthinkable, but that is who Bill Russell was."

The basketball legend, who died Sunday aged 88, was doggedly committed to using his platform to amplify his political actions, setting a template for ...

During his first championship run in 1957, Russell blocked Jack Coleman in the final minute of regulation in the deciding Game 7 to keep the Celtics in the game and allow them to eventually win the title. In 1961, he boycotted a game in Kentucky after a white waitress refused to serve two of his Black teammates at a coffee shop. He was subjected to racism throughout his career, even in Boston, the city he represented for 13 years: vandals once broke into his Massachusetts home and covered the walls with racist graffiti. During his 13 seasons in the league, he led the Boston Celtics to 11 NBA championships, including eight consecutive titles from 1959 to 1966. And yet, despite the outpouring of kind words in his memory, Russell may still be the most underappreciated icon in NBA history. To begin with, Russell is the winningest player in NBA history and it’s not even really close.

Properly measuring the greatness of Bill Russell, the legendary Boston Celtics center who died Sunday at the age of 88, has always been a challenge in our ...

Sportswriters jeeringly referred to him as “ Felton X” for his role in the Black Power movement, and the abuse he received from Boston fans was epitomized in 1971 when a group of burglars broke into his Massachusetts house, spray-painted racist slurs, vandalized his trophy case and defecated in his bed. He endured untold abuse from fans, journalists and basketball organizations dating back to his years at San Francisco, and he developed a reputation as a cold, aloof person — rather than a happy warrior — because of his refusal to bow to racist forces both within the NBA and broader American society. And though the NBA’s record on racial diversity in coaching lags behind its reputation, Russell’s coaching success forced white front offices to realize that Black coaches could win, opening the door for a number of legends. After teammates Satch Sanders and Sam Jones were refused service at a coffee shop in Lexington, Kentucky, in 1961, Russell joined them in a boycott of a game against the Hawks. At the University of San Francisco, Russell led a program that had been below .500 before his arrival to national championships in 1955 and 1956, earning NCAA Tournament Most Outstanding Player honors in the first of those efforts and UPI Player of the Year honors in the second. Three years later, Russell was again at the center of a historic act of protest. And in Russell’s case, the championships say even more than the individual attributes. For one, Russell’s pioneering impact as a defender is still felt today, in an NBA that puts a premium on versatile and “switchable” big men. We once calculated that each of the five players who’d played for the best defenses in NBA history (relative to league average) were part of the Celtics’ dynasty, with Russell’s average team suppressing offense by a staggering 6.1 points per 100 possessions relative to league average. But as ring-counting has fallen out of style in favor of ever-more-sophisticated individual statistics, it can be hard to contextualize the legacy of a player who averaged 15.1 points per game, had no official numbers for his famous shot-blocking ability and did most of his winning in an NBA with fewer than 10 teams. Which was delayed by several months because Russell was 1 leading the U.S. to gold in the 1956 Summer Olympics (held in November and December because the host country, Australia, is in the Southern Hemisphere). easily its best, and they produced the league’s best record. And yet, in many ways, Russell created the NBA as we know it today.

The NBA icon built a legacy off the court as a voice for civil rights.

On the court, he was the greatest champion in basketball history. “I didn’t want to go to Mississippi. I was like anyone else. Charles Evers asked him if he’d be willing to visit the state and stage its first integrated basketball camp. His belief in equality and the stances he took helped create a pathway that athletes today continue to walk in. I was afraid I might get killed,” Russell would later write. “In the end, I live with the hopes that when I die it will be inscribed for me: Bill Russell. He was a man.” I called Eastern Airlines and ordered my ticket.” And it was Russell, Alcindor and Brown sitting beside Ali in Cleveland in 1967 when the boxer announced he was refusing induction into the U.S. military to fight in the Vietnam War. Russell didn’t just risk sullying his reputation, he put his life at risk in the wake of the 1963 assassination of civil rights activist Medgar Evers in Jackson, Mississippi. Just days after Evers was slain, Russell reached out to the leader’s brother, Charles Evers. He wanted to inquire about what he could do to help. When former President Barack Obama presented Russell with the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2011, he called it an example of how he “stood up for rights and dignity of all men.” In a time when Jim Crow laws in the South existed to silence the views of Black people, he was groomed to be an unapologetic thinker. Charles was about to drive off when the attendant pulled a gun and said, “Don’t you try that, boy, unless you want to get shot,” Russell recalled in his book.

Bill Russell goes up for a block against the Los Angeles Lakers. Russell playing for the Boston Celtics against the L.A. Lakers in 1963.Photograph ...

That he lived to be an uncontroversially beloved culture-hero—given the fires of those years, and given the pressures he so elegantly accepted—is one of history’s miracles, a dark but brightening irony that might have made him cough up one of his surprisingly high-pitched, cackling laughs. When he talked about his involvement with the civil-rights movement, he didn’t sound like a happy warrior or an eager activist—just a man who, by dint of his color and his status, had a job that he knew he couldn’t shirk. He loaned his presence, loaned that face and his voice, to help solve a problem he hadn’t caused. The cost and the substance of his greatness was total awareness, an impossible density of movement and thought. Say the guy in the middle has the ball and I want the guy on the left to take the shot. The fifties and sixties were excruciating years in America, and they became a social gantlet for Russell. He was big, smart, self-accepting, sometimes remote, rightly pissed—the kind of Black man who flips switches in the wrong kinds of minds. Part of it was the intelligence and rectitude of his playing style. The details of his devastating genius sound fake: his teams won eleven N.B.A. championships in thirteen seasons, and he won five M.V.P. awards, in a time when that award was decided by a vote among the players themselves—his helpless rivals, undoubtedly bitter at his stinginess with victory, found his greatness impossible to ignore. Over six-nine with long limbs and air-cutting speed, he offered his physical and mental gifts at the altar of defense. Russell’s gait was straighter, his hair darker, and his mien, at least in public, more consistently grave when, during the fifties and sixties, as a slim, graceful, brilliant center for the Boston Celtics, he unspooled a record of excellence unmatched in American organized sports. Many of his most far-fetched deeds were un-videotaped and therefore subject to the twin whims of memory and time. Or he grinned from the crowd at games or award shows, sometimes—well, surprisingly often—flipping a quick middle finger at his friends.

Rare was the working person around N.B.A. arenas these past few decades who never had an encounter with the majestic Bill Russell. On occasion, mostly a ...

I remember him telling me that by going to law school, I could be part of a generation that could build off what his generation had started, and effect change in a very different way.” In the book, Russell wrote that he and Auerbach had seldom socialized or delved into personal or social issues. While the contemporary best-ever debate is laser focused on Air Jordan versus King James, Russell’s contextualization of the argument only required flashing the ring he wore that 2007 day at the rookie transition program — a gift from the N.B.A. commissioner at the time, David Stern, commemorating all 11 of Russell’s titles. And of course, off the court, too, with his activism during the civil rights era.” “I tell all the kids — rich, poor, Black, white — that you must be your own counsel,” he told me. “He obviously had a big impact on me, as a center, always talking about blocking the shot but keeping it inbounds, things like that. I was a terrified young reporter for The New York Post in the late 1970s when my editor ordered me to “get Russell” for an assigned story. Russell nodded and said, “Wait outside for me.” So I parked myself in the first row of seats behind the broadcast table. “Quite true,” Russell responded in his gravelly voiced, meditative manner. I listened with fascination as Joakim Noah, a player of French, Swedish and Cameroonian descent, asked Russell if he felt underappreciated in racially polarized Boston despite winning 11 titles in 13 seasons, from 1957 through 1969. As I hopelessly stammered through my introduction, Russell looked up from a plate of food and said nothing. “He’s from Vecsey’s paper,” Cunningham told Russell, referring to Peter Vecsey, the widely known N.B.A. columnist.

There are no superlatives, no metrics, no numbers, no generational or era comparisons that can account for a life lived, especially one as furiously ...

It was not Bill Russell who was trapped, but his former surroundings, his city and his country that were forced to reckon with their behavior and attitudes, to answer the question as to why their greatest champion often wanted nothing to do with them. For decades, the prevailing narrative of Russell was that he was trapped in the bitterness of his time, but that wasn't exactly true. The coming days will be filled with Russell tributes and reductive debates because, in the end, he was irreducible. When he didn't want to be seen, he wasn't. There is now, since 2013, a Bill Russell statue, just as there is an Auerbach and a Bird (at least his shoes), a Williams and an Orr. When he wanted to be seen, he was -- and during the last 15 years of his life he stood as a powerful specter, equal parts signature laugh and distant. He was distant from the city of his fame -- and yet was constantly present. This was his bargain, and it was immutable -- you could not celebrate the Celtics beating the 76ers without acknowledging the unequal treatment of him and his people. He was the living link to the birth of the game -- and the conscience of activism, from Jackie Robinson to Colin Kaepernick, for more than half a century. He was defined for years, not by what was done to him by his homeland, but why he didn't accept it better. He was part of a heritage of incredible athletes in Oakland, California, only after racism pressured his parents into leaving his birthplace of Monroe, Louisiana, away from their familiarity and opportunity. Even Russell's greatest on-court feat of winning 11 NBA titles over his 13-year career is constantly threatened by the criticism there were only eight NBA teams when Russell was winning all those championships, and thus they were somehow less legitimate than the real championships of today because the postseason wasn't interminably long, as it is today. With Russell's death will come a cease-fire, rhetoric replaced by a temporary reverence, a quiet admiration for his dignity and towering accomplishments and the bittersweet passing of time.