BOSTON — Doc Rivers wasn’t the only former Celtic enjoying a homecoming Sunday at TD Garden.
Also making his return to Causeway Street was Los Angeles Clippers forward Glen Davis — the man who forever will be known to Celtics fans as “Big Baby.”
“It always feels good to come back here to Boston,” Davis said after the game, which the Clippers won in a rout, 119-106. “This is where you started your career, for me, and I have some great memories: Finals twice, NBA championship, and also just the relationships are just awesome. So, it was good seeing a lot of familiar faces.”
Davis was a rookie on the 2008 Celtics squad that took home the title and a key reserve when Boston fell to the Los Angeles Lakers in the NBA Finals two years later. That second series featured the legendary “Shrek and Donkey” game, in which Davis and Nate Robinson combined for 30 points off the bench in a 96-89 Celtics win.
The 29-year-old sees some similarities between those Rivers-led Celtics teams and this year’s Clippers, who at 49-25 own the NBA’s fifth-best record.
“In some ways because Doc,” Davis said, “and the way he coaches, and what Doc went through with that other team and now the team that we have, in some ways is similar.”
While Davis enjoyed being back on the Garden parquet, his on-court performance Sunday was far from memorable. The big man finished with four points and zero rebounds in 14 minutes and, as part of L.A.’s much-maligned second unit, was on the floor while the Celtics trimmed a 35-point deficit down to 13 in the fourth quarter.
Davis was succinct in his analysis of that final frame:
Thumbnail photo via David Butler II/USA TODAY Sports Images
