SCOTT WEDMAN TO BE GUEST ON THIS WEEK’S SHOW
It’ll be bombs away with a former NBA sharpshooter.
Former NBA player Scott Wedman, who won two championships with the Boston Celtics in the 1980s, will be the featured guest on this week’s episode of Landmark Live, the newspaper’s videocast.
Wedman will join hosts Ivan Foley and Guy Speckman of The Landmark on the Thursday, Oct. 13 broadcast. The show will go live at 6 p.m. on Facebook on the newspaper’s page (find us at Platte County Landmark) and the video will remain posted on the page for viewing at your leisure.
For the show, Wedman will join The Landmark’s bad boys of broadcasting at The Landmark’s studio in downtown Platte City.
Wedman is a resident of Platte County, where he has lived since the 1970s. He first moved to Platte County while playing for the Kansas City Kings. Wedman, listed at 6’7” in his playing days, was the sixth overall pick of the Kings in the 1974 NBA draft.
Wedman was a proficient shooter for the Kings while playing under coaches Phil Johnson and Cotton Fitzsimmons and alongside Tiny Archibald and Otis Birdsong, among others. He twice represented the Kings in the NBA All-Star Game.
His personal statistics hit a career peak in 1979–80 and 1980–81, with a scoring average of 19.0 points per game. On Jan. 2, 1980, he scored 45 points in an overtime win at Utah for his career high. Wedman was a key to Kansas City’s postseason success in 1981. Despite finishing the regular season with only a 40–42 record, the Kings caught fire in the playoffs, beating Portland 2–1 and Phoenix 4–3 before losing four games to 1 to Houston in the Western Conference finals.
At the 1981 NBA draft, seeing that the Kings could not afford to keep both Wedman and fellow All-Star Otis Birdsong, Kansas City traded Birdsong and let Wedman sign with Cleveland. Signing a $1 million contract as a free agent, Wedman’s scoring initially declined due to injuries, as he averaged 10.9 points per game in 1981–82, playing 30 minutes per game in 54 games for the Cavaliers.
In 1983, Wedman was traded by Cleveland to the Boston Celtics. It was a move that allowed him to become a world champion.
In Boston, he was instrumental as a player off the bench in the Celtics’ NBA championships in 1984 and 1986, playing under coach KC Jones. While a Celtic, Wedman joined Bill Walton in coming off the Celtics bench on a roster that included NBA Hall of Famers such as Larry Bird, Kevin McHale, Dennis Johnson, Robert Parish and Tiny Archibald. Wedman often spelled Larry Bird and Kevin McHale or replaced them when they were injured.
“He was a vital piece of our team. He knew that players like Larry and Kevin were going to get their minutes, and he accepted his role without hesitation,” Celtics Coach KC Jones said at the time about Wedman’s tenure in Boston. “He had the perfect attitude. As a coach, you couldn’t ask for anything more. He was an important piece of two championship teams.”
Boston fans remember Wedman’s performance in the Memorial Day Massacre, a moniker for Game 1 of the 1985 NBA Finals. Coming off the bench, Wedman hit all 11 of his shots, including four three-pointers, in Boston’s 148–114 win over the Lakers. On Landmark Live, if things go as expected a YouTube highlight clip from Wedman’s amazing performance on that day will be played.
Wedman averaged 14.9 minutes in his five seasons in Boston, shooting 47.2% from the floor and 35.5% on three-pointers, averaging 6.2 points and 2.1 rebounds.
In 1987, he was traded by the Celtics with Sam Vincent to the Seattle SuperSonics for a 1989 second-round draft choice. However, he retired and did not play a game for the SuperSonics.
Wedman was born in Harper, Kan., about 50 miles from Wichita, then played high school basketball in Denver, Colo. He played college basketball at Colorado University, which that time played in the Big 8 Conference. He has been inducted into the Colorado Sports Hall of Fame and the Colorado University Athletic Hall of Fame.