The St. Louis Hawks had a significant role in launching Bill Russell into a NBA career with the Boston Celtics.
In April 1956, the Celtics traded for the rights to the Hawks’ first-round draft spot and used it to take Russell. Eight months later, when Russell made his NBA debut with the Celtics, it came in a game against the Hawks.
A five-time recipient of the NBA Most Valuable Player Award who helped the Celtics win 11 league championships, Russell was a center who revolutionized the game, excelling at rebounding, blocking shots and playing defense.
Draft moves
With the tandem of Russell and guard K.C. Jones, the University of San Francisco won consecutive NCAA basketball championships in 1955 and 1956.
Russell generally was regarded as the best amateur basketball player in the country, but at the NBA draft on April 30, 1956, the Rochester Royals used the first overall pick to take Duquesne guard Sihugo Green.
According to the New York Times, money was a factor in the Royals’ decision. The Harlem Globetrotters were expected to make a lucrative offer to Russell and the cash-strapped Royals didn’t want to get into a bidding war with them.
Defending the choice, Royals owner Lester Harrison called Green “the best all-around player in the country, bar none,” International News Service reported.
Russell told the San Francisco Examiner, “I think Rochester made a good choice for its No. 1 man. I always said Sihugo and my friend, K.C. Jones, were the two best ballplayers I ever looked at.”
(Green played in nine NBA seasons, including four with the Hawks, and finished his career as Russell’s teammate with the 1965-66 Celtics.)
Please come to Boston
After the Royals selected Green, the Hawks, with the No. 2 overall pick, had the chance to take Russell. Like the Royals, though, the Hawks didn’t think they could afford him, especially if the Globetrotters bid high, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and the New York Times reported.
The Hawks also were looking to generate local interest. In the 1955-56 season, their first since moving from Milwaukee to St. Louis, they finished 33-39. Club owner Ben Kerner thought Celtics center Ed Macauley, a St. Louis native who had been a standout performer at St. Louis University, was just the sort of popular local player the Hawks needed to attract customers.
In exchange for Macauley, the Celtics got the Hawks’ draft spot and used it to select Russell.
Two days later, on May 2, the Celtics sent Cliff Hagan to the Hawks in a cash transaction. Kerner said the acquisition of Hagan “had nothing to do with” the deal for Russell, the Post-Dispatch reported. Over time, though, several publications, including the Post-Dispatch, reported the transaction as Macauley and Hagan to the Hawks for Russell.
(The Celtics made quite a haul in the 1956 draft, getting K.C. Jones and Tommy Heinsohn of Holy Cross in addition to Russell.)
After acquiring Russell, Celtics coach Red Auerbach told the Boston Globe, “He’s the greatest defensive center I’ve ever seen.”
Russell said to the San Francisco Examiner, “I was pleased when I heard I was drafted. It was flattering to know they thought enough of me to pick me among the first.”
The Celtics in 1950 had become the first NBA team to draft a black player, Chuck Cooper.
Decades later, in a 2013 interview with Bill Simmons that aired on the NBA’s TV network, Russell, discussing the trade to acquire him, said, “St. Louis was overwhelmingly racist. If I would have gotten drafted by St. Louis, I wouldn’t have been in the NBA.”
Great expectations
Though drafted, Russell remained an amateur so he could play for the United States in the 1956 Summer Olympics. The Games at Melbourne, Australia, were held Nov. 22 to Dec. 8.
After helping the U.S. win a gold medal, Russell returned home and got married. He and his bride arrived in Boston on Dec. 16. Three days later, Russell signed a one-year $17,000 contract with the Celtics.
“He is one of the most publicized performers to join a Boston team in years _ and if he lives up to his advance notices he will belong in a class with Ted Williams,” columnist Harold Kaese wrote.
Jack Barry, who covered the Celtics for the Globe, wrote, “Bill Russell may revolutionize the game of basketball … Russell could be the first player to become a drawing card on his defensive ability.”
After three practice sessions with the Celtics, Russell was deemed ready to play in a regular-season game. His first opportunity came on Dec. 22 against the Hawks at Boston Garden.
Arnie Risen, in the NBA since 1948, was the Celtics’ starting center that Saturday afternoon. Russell came off the bench, totaled six points (he missed eight of 11 shots and all four free throws), but grabbed 16 rebounds and excelled on defense. Boxscore
“Demonstrating his great defensive strength,” Russell “three times went high into the air to block shots by Bob Pettit, generally considered the NBA’s top big man,” United Press reported.
Risen told the wire service, “He’ll block a shot by any man who shoots straight away in front of him. Fellows will have to be very tricky to score against him.”
(In a 1999 interview with the Globe’s Bob Ryan, Risen said, “I feel flattered when I hear Bill Russell say I was his mentor. I’m not so sure that isn’t just an old friend boosting a teammate. If I did anything for him, it was to tell him what to expect from the other players in the league, and to help him with our offense.”)
Russell said to United Press, “I have to admit I was very nervous. I was very tight all the way. My shooting was way off and I was just plain lousy at the foul line.”
Regarding his four missed free throws, Russell said to the Globe, “I choked.”
Auerbach told United Press that Russell “revealed his potential but also his greenness.”
Celtics owner Walter Brown said to the Globe, “I don’t care if he can’t shoot, as long as he gets those rebounds and cuts down some of those guys who have been murdering us for years.”
True greatness
The Celtics won the NBA championship in Russell’s rookie year, beating the Hawks in the final round of the playoffs. The next season, the Hawks won their lone title, prevailing against the Celtics in the finals.
After that, Russell and the Celtics dominated, winning eight consecutive NBA championships from 1959 to 1966.
Russell had several strong performances against the Hawks, including:
_ 37 rebounds on Dec. 23, 1966. Boxscore
_ 35 points on Nov. 14, 1961. In that game, the Hawks’ Clyde Lovellette, averaging 23 points a game, “couldn’t cope with Russell’s defensive tactics” and was held to two points, the Associated Press reported. Boxscore
_ 29 rebounds and 26 points on Nov. 21, 1962. Boxscore
_ 28 points and 27 rebounds on Feb. 4, 1964. Boxscore
In 1966, Russell became the NBA’s first black head coach. In three seasons as player-coach of the Celtics, Russell led them to two NBA championships.
Russell five times led the NBA in rebounding. The top three career rebounders in the NBA are Wilt Chamberlain (22.9 per game), Russell (22.5) and Pettit (16.2).
During the 1960s, when Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was a teen named Lew Alcindor at Power Memorial High School in New York, he saw the Celtics play many times at Madison Square Garden.
“The man I studied was Bill Russell,” Abdul-Jabbar said to Bob Ryan. “I learned so much. Watching him, I learned the dynamics of the game, and how to win.”
RetroSimba 
The Boston Celtics struck gold in that 1956 draft. It hurts to say it but there’s a lot of truth in that Bill Russell interview regarding the situation in St. Louis back then. In that same 1956 draft the Hawks picked a very talented player by the name of Willie Naulls. He would last only 19 games with St. Louis. He would go on to have a ten year career with four all star selections and three NBA championship rings. In 1961 the Hawks for the first time selected an African – American in the first round by the name of Cleo Hill. He would last only one season here.
Thanks for your insights, Phillip. I enjoyed learning from you about Willie Naulls and Cleo Hill. I might follow up and do a piece on Hill someday now that I know about him. I appreciate that you, as a St. Louisan who is proud of his city, have the openminded-ness to acknowledge the city’s problems regarding race relations. It takes that kind of open-mindedness for progress to happen.
Hill, according to Wikipedia, denied that his race was a factor in his NBA struggles, saying, “it wasn’t racial. It was points.” Hagan, Pettit, and Lovellette, referred to as “The Big Three,” wanted the ball. Lenny Wilkens, who had seen a lot of playing time the year before at guard (as a rookie) with Si Green, was lost to the team for most of the season due to a military commitment. That 1961-62 Hawks team had the worst (29-61) record of their time in St. Louis. Hagan and Wilkens were exceptions who saw a lot of playing time as rookies for the Hawks, but owner Ben Kerner (who was the only NBA owner at the time whose only source of income was his basketball team), had a “just win now” philosophy. His final coach-Richie Guerin-would be the only one to last at least three full seasons.
Thanks for the info. A couple of notes about that 1961-62 season that you cited: the Celtics, by contrast, were 60-20 and that was one of the seasons in which Bill Russell was named NBA MVP. The Celtics were 6-2 vs. the Hawks in the 1961-62 season. Bob Pettit had 28 points and 15 rebounds in one of those Hawks wins, and Cliff Hagan had 43 points and 12 rebounds in the other.
Sihugo Green!!??!
I never heard of Sihugo Green until researching the Bill Russell piece. He was an all-America at Duquesne. In 1955, he and Dave Ricketts led Duquesne to the NIT championship. Ricketts went on to be a backup catcher for the Cardinals and then a longtime coach for the Pirates and Cardinals. According to The Pittsburgh Press, Green was from Brooklyn and he said one reason he chose to attend Duquesne was because his parents wanted him at “a small Catholic college with a curfew.” Green was 6 feet 3 and “his jumping ability was extraordinary,” The Pittsburgh Press reported. He drove to the basket for most of his points. Duquesne athletic director Red Manning told the newspaper, “He had the best first step of anybody I’ve ever seen in the game.” One reason he didn’t became a top player in the NBA, though, is he lacked an outside shot.
It’s also interesting to hear about the influence of the Globetrotters. Wilt Chamberlain played for the Globetrotters before he joined the NBA. They probably outdrew most NBA teams at the time.
Good point, Ken. In his book “From Ghetto to Glory,” Bob Gibson said that after his baseball tryout with the Cardinals’ Omaha farm team, he was offered a $4,000 contract. Gibson liked Omaha GM Bill Bergesch and manager Johnny Keane but wanted more money. When the Harlem Globetrotters offered Gibson a $1,000-a-month contract, Gibson said, “I picked up the telephone and called Bill Bergesch. I would sign with the Cardinals for a bonus of a thousand dollars, play out the (1957) season for another $3,000, then join the Globetrotters at $1,000 a month for four months of the baseball off-season. The total was $8,000, but the real value of the deal was that it kept me alive in both sports. I still wasn’t ready to pick one.”
Ed Macauley would later win a championship with the Celtics and Russell. The Celtics and Hawks played in back to back Finals, the first one being quite a thriller. St Louis won the following year and it was glorious. bring the NBA back to STL!
Thanks for commenting. According to basketball-reference.com, Ed Macauley played for the Celtics from 1950-56 and for the Hawks from 1956-59. He averaged 17.5 points per game as a pro. In his last 2 seasons (1957-58 and 1958-59), Macauley had the dual role of head coach and player with the Hawks .His overall record as head coach was 89-48: https://www.basketball-reference.com/players/m/macaued01.html
And Macauley began his pro career in St. Louis with the Bombers in 1949.