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Everything Brad Stevens said of Hugo Gonzalez, newest Boston Celtics wing

Everything Brad Stevens said of Hugo Gonzalez, newest Boston Celtics wing

Yahoo2 days ago

While the Celtics were rumored to be potentially active in the first round of the 2025 NBA Draft, they elected to stay put with their No. 28 overall pick. The C's selected Hugo Gonzalez, the Real Madrid wing, late Wednesday to add him to the roster.
While Gonzalez hasn't played much at Real Madrid — which isn't a huge surprise — the Celtics liked enough of what they've seen out of him over the past few years. Gonzalez, 19, didn't earn much playing time considering the talent on the Real Madrid roster. It's common for teenagers to not play as much at that level.
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Despite that, the Celtics went ahead and drafted Gonzalez at 28th overall anyway. Boston president Brad Stevens said he chatted with Gonzalez soon after the pick, telling him to enjoy the night. But considering it was past 5 a.m. in Spain, Gonzalez joked it was a little too late for that. Real Madrid had also just won the Liga ACB title, so it was an eventful day for Gonzalez as he saw his dream come true.
Stevens confirmed that Gonzalez will come stateside for next season, so the plan is not to draft-and-stash him overseas. Here's everything Stevens said about Gonzalez and why the Celtics picked him:
On why they picked him...
"We've been watching Hugo for a long time. He's obviously been on everybody's radar I think for a long time and then followed his year with a great Real Madrid organization and team closely and watched him in all the U-18s and those types of things. Just a big fan of how he plays. He's tough, he's hard playing, he cuts, he goes after the ball, he competes. He's got all the intangibles of a winning basketball player. There's things he can get better at just like everybody else at that age, but competitiveness is at a high level."
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On his youth...
'I think he's a young guy but a little bit of an old soul. I think he's played with adults for a long time. He's playing on a team full of experienced former NBA players and high, high level pros all from all over the world. So this guy has been around it at a high level, been coached really well. I think when you talk about years overall, yes, he's young. But years of basketball experience, the things that we will think are important, it's probably pretty high. "
On balancing best player available and experience...
'I think when you're in the draft, you've got what, 15 roster spots and then you have three extra two-ways and when you're talking about the draft, you've got to find guys that you think are going to be good fits for how your group plays and will bring the competitiveness and competitive character required to be a part of your group. And so I thought there were several good players still available there late and we will go back to the drawing board and look at what we're going to do tomorrow. But we were really excited that Hugo was available at 28.'
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On if Gonzalez could play in the upcoming Las Vegas Summer League...
'That's a good question. I think they just finished up a game tonight. I just talked to him. It's 5 in the morning over there. I said, 'Enjoy your night.' He goes, 'Eh, it's a little late.' So I said, 'OK, maybe I'll enjoy it for you.' So I don't know. You always want — you're always anxious to get your guys over and do that. Literally, they play so late that we'll see how he's doing and see how it feels. Summer League won't define what his career will look like over the course of time, although we'll all be antsy to see. That's just kind of the way we're wired. There's nothing else to do in July.'
On process of scouting Gonzalez...
'He's playing around a bunch of studs, guys that have been old pros. They know how to play. They're hard to beat out. They're physical, tough, smart, again, extremely well-coached. When you're that age in that situation you've gotta earn your stripes. When we went and took our team there years ago in the preseason, we played against a 16-year-old (Luka) Doncic that hardly got in, right? So Hugo's a little bit older and I'm not comparing him to Doncic, but I will say it's great when you get to play on those teams.
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'When you put on a Real Madrid jersey, you put on the responsibility similar to here. And I think that that's a good thing. When we interviewed Hugo a couple weeks ago on Zoom, it's really clear that he's about the team and he accepts and is willing to play any role it takes. That's not an earned trait for everybody that's in the draft because most of these guys have never sat. And with that comes a humility and also an understanding that you've gotta invest every day just to take advantage of whatever opportunity you get.'
On figuring out Gonzalez's potential...
'It's a good question. I think maybe it goes to earlier question about age or whatever. Guys that we think are really good players that fit the fabric of how we want to play from a physical, competitive and toughness standpoint, we'll try to prioritize. Baylor (Scheierman) fit that last year and I thought Baylor started off really slow. He struggled right out of the gate and then I thought he played great at the end of the season and we're excited about his future. Sometimes people think a 24-year-old is old and can't get better. We just talked that we'd love to have our 39-year-old back. There is a long road ahead for a lot of these guys and for me, I look a little less about the age and more about the competitive character and makeup.'
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Your Euro 2025 cheat sheet. Plus: USWNT's Biyendolo gets well-deserved recognition

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