Why the Boston Celtics' 17th Championship Meant So Much

There are some things you know you’re never going to forget. In my sports life, a few of those memories stick out. There was my first trip to the Boston Garden, when I got to see Larry Bird and the Celtics take on the New Jersey Nets.  I was very young at the time, but knew even then that I would never forget my first glimpse of the famous parquet floor.  There was the time I hit my first game-winning jumpshot and, even though it was only a summer league game played outside at a park, I was mobbed by my teammates and treated like a king.  A young kid just doesn’t forget that.  There was the time the Red Sox won their first World Series, snapping an 86-year drought and sending me, and all of Red Sox Nation, into euphoria.  I was a senior in high school, and when Foulke sent that final out over to first base, my whole childhood, spent rooting for a cursed team, was validated. There was the time I missed two huge free throws in a game that could hav...