1985 NBA Finals Games 1~6, Celtics vs. Lakers

[shalott]

Have some bandwidth to burn before the end of the month, so I'm leaving these games up until bandwidth runs out or May arrives, whichever comes first. Will delete the game directory at that point.

Edited to add: Annnd May is here, so I'm taking the links down. Again, thank you all for the v. kind comments, and I hope you enjoyed the games. (Relatively) permanent links are in the attachment. Please don't share these links on other forums.

Quality is pretty decent, commentary is in English. If you have trouble with broken downloads, please try a download manager.


Game One (148-114, Celtics) - 1.7 gb
Game 1, otherwise known as the Memorial Day Massacre, broke the record for the largest win margin in a playoff game in NBA history. It was so bad for the Lakers that the official NBA-released DVDs of the 1985 championship games cut off almost the entire first half -- because of missing footage, goes the official spiel, but in actuality to spare the feelings of Lakers fans, I suspect. I got my hands on the complete game through other sources, but the file quality is a bit worse, so I didn't shrink the resolution as I did for the rest of the games.

Game in a nutshell: Everything goes right for the Celtics. Everything goes wrong for the Lakers.


Game Two (109-102, Lakers) - 1 gb
In Game 2, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, largely criticized for the humiliating loss in Game 1, showed that he wasn't quite ready yet to be stuck in a rocking chair. In Boston Garden, one of the most hostile arenas for road teams to play in, he knocked down 30 points, grabbed 17 rebounds, had 8 assists and blocked 3 shots.

Kareem:

Well, it feels good, you know, to know that you're not dead. I had people throwing dirt on my face. It's good to know that, well, that was a little premature.

The series was split with one game apiece for each team, and moved to Los Angeles for the next three games.


Game Three (136-111, Lakers) - 875 mb
Same as Game 2, only more so. Kareem also broke the record for playoff scoring here, and looked completely unmoved ("Let's get back to the game, eh?")


Game Four (107-105, Celtics) - 1 gb
Close, close game. The lead changed hands at the end of every quarter -- 32-28 at the end of the first, 58-59 at the end of the second, 84-82 at the end of the third, and 107-105 at the end of the game. Magic made a jumper to tie the game at 105 with 19 seconds remaining on the clock, but Dennis Johnson hit one as the clock ran out to win the game.


Game Five (120-111, Lakers) - 930 mb
Lakers lead, Celtics chase and almost close the gap, but don't quite make it.


Game Six (111-100, Lakers) - 801 mb
The Lakers win the championship where they want it: on the floor of the Boston Garden, the first road team ever to do so, in front of thousands of hostile Celtics fans.

But the story I love best about this game was told by somebody who wasn't even at the stadium. Rod "Hot Rod" Hundley, who'd been with the Lakers from Minneapolis to Los Angeles until 1963 and was a member of three of those losing Lakers teams against Boston, describes it thus:

I'm watching the game by myself at home, and really loving it. And all of a sudden the phone rings, I grab the phone, and a voice says, "Are you watching it?"

And it was Tommy Hawkins, my old teammate with the Lakers. I said, "Yeah, yeah, I'm watching, Hawk." He said, "I've got my old uniform on." He had his old Laker uniform on in front of the TV screen, watching this game! Now that is when you really know that they had our number, we finally could get this done and get a win. This was incredible.

[azzazzel]

Awesome work for a rookie like you man... Big props to you :Jumpy: Keep the awesome work

[Kobe-LAL]

Man! It's great! Without attachment! And Lakers won the title!
Thanks a lot for sharing!

[kruko25]

WOW!! man u put whole series on one thread, great idea...
one question - game 6 is from "greates Games" series??????

[jeahwe]

shalott, you are great! thanks again :-)

[Bigcurso]

wow this is great ur amazing!

i want the 3 and the 6th! ill try to donwload them tomorrow if i could... ill give u some points... thanx a lot!

[love_3u_baby]

wow,man i think it is the greatest ever upload in M2~~you put the whole serous in here~~that is absolutely upload of the year in M2 I think~~man thank u very much for your amazing job!!keep uploading man

[shalott]

Thank you all for the kind comments!

kruko25, yes, it's from the Greatest Games series.

jeahwe, thank /you/. Loved the game you linked.

[gman_il]

wow man great job , i didn't have all the games , i only have 4 to 6.
now i can complete my collection.
i'll dondate some points when i'm done downloading.

[diogonigri]

This is great, direct links, quick links, no bullsh*t attachment, so I GAVE YOU POINTS !!!
GREAT WORK