1964-65 NBA Finals
April 18, 1965 – April 25, 1965
1964-65 NBA Finals result: BCBoston Celtics def. LALLos Angeles Lakers, 4-1, April 18, 1965 – April 25, 1965.
Result
| Team | Series | |
|---|---|---|
| Champion | BCBoston Celtics | 4-1 |
| Runner-up | LALLos Angeles Lakers |
Games
| Game | Date | Result | Venue |
|---|---|---|---|
| Game 1 | April 18, 1965 | BCBoston Celtics 142–110 Los Angeles Lakers | Boston Garden, Boston, Massachusetts |
| Game 2 | April 19, 1965 | BCBoston Celtics 129–123 Los Angeles Lakers | Boston Garden, Boston, Massachusetts |
| Game 3 | April 21, 1965 | LALLos Angeles Lakers 126–105 Boston Celtics | Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena, Los Angeles, California |
| Game 4 | April 23, 1965 | BCBoston Celtics 112–99 Los Angeles Lakers | Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena, Los Angeles, California |
| Game 5 | April 25, 1965 | BCBoston Celtics 129–96 Los Angeles Lakers | Boston Garden, Boston, Massachusetts |
Finals MVP
The Finals MVP award was not introduced until 1969; no Finals MVP was named for this series.
Series context
The 1964-65 Finals brought Boston and Los Angeles together for the third time in four years, but this edition was lopsided from the start. The Celtics had their best regular season yet at 62-18, while the Lakers went 49-31 to reach the Finals despite a season-altering injury: Elgin Baylor suffered a serious knee injury during the playoff run that sidelined him for the remainder of the postseason, robbing Los Angeles of half of its Baylor-West offensive punch. Boston reached the Finals off the back of one of the most famous defensive plays in NBA history, John Havlicek's steal of an inbounds pass late in the Eastern Division Finals against Philadelphia, immortalized by broadcaster Johnny Most's call of "Havlicek stole the ball!" With Baylor unavailable, the Finals were never close. Boston blew out Los Angeles in Game 1, 142-110, and won a tighter Game 2, 129-123. The Lakers, playing without their All-Star forward, won their only game of the series in Game 3, 126-105, but Boston answered with a 112-99 win in Game 4 and closed out the championship in Game 5, 129-96. Jerry West carried an enormous scoring burden for Los Angeles in Baylor's absence, totaling 447 points across the 1965 playoffs and posting 45 points in Game 2 and 43 in Game 3. Bill Russell anchored Boston's title run with 302 rebounds and 76 assists across the playoffs, including 30 boards in the closeout Game 5, and Sam Jones exploded for 37 points in Game 4. This was Boston's ninth consecutive Finals appearance and eighth title overall, the seventh of the eight-year championship streak, and it marked Tom Heinsohn's final NBA game as he retired after the series. It was also one of the most lopsided Finals of the Celtics dynasty, a testament to just how dominant this particular Celtics team was even within the context of their own run. Los Angeles had reached the Finals by beating Baltimore in six games in the Western Division finals, the very series in which Baylor's knee gave out, meaning the Lakers arrived at the championship round already compromised. The scoring gap across the five games was stark: Boston outscored Los Angeles by an average of 12.6 points per contest, 123.4 points per game to the Lakers' 110.8, and the lopsided five-game result meant this stood as the last Celtics Finals appearance that did not stretch to at least six games until their 2024 championship run.
Sources
Data last verified: 11 August 2026.
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