Heated Kevin Garnett called out ‘classless’ Kyrie Irving for stomping on Celtics logo and fuelling Boston bad blood with disrespectful gesture

"Boston is in the way between our goal."

Those were Kyrie Irving's fighting words after the Mavericks clinched their spot in the 2024 NBA Finals with a 124-103 Game 5 victory over the Minnesota Timberwolves.

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Irving had a controversial two-year stint with the Celtics - the team that now stands in his way of winning second NBA championship - between 2017-2019 that ended with him becoming public enemy number one.

After stating his desire to re-sign with the franchise that birthed legends like Bill Russell and Larry Bird, Irving left to sign with Brooklyn alongside Kevin Durant as a free agent in the summer of 2019.

Kyrie instantly became a villain and was routinely booed whenever he returned to TD Garden.

In Game 4 of the Nets' first-round playoff series against the Cs in 2021, Irving had 39 points and 11 rebounds to give Brooklyn a commanding 3-1 series lead.

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The TD Garden crowd rained down chants of "F*** you Kyrie"  throughout the game and afterwards the mercurial guard fired back in controversial fashion.

As the teams left the court, Irving appeared to stomp and wipe his foot on the face of the Celtics' logo, known as Lucky the Leprechaun.

Sports fans are nothing if not tribal and Kyrie incensed an entire fanbase who were already baying for blood.

His impudent gesture was perceived as a personal and unnecessary shot at the very heart of the Celtics franchise and smacked of disrespect.

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Many a Boston legend called out Kyrie for his below-the-belt act, including Cedric Maxwell who posted, "why the classless act?".

'08 champion Kevin Garnett was equally enraged.

"So nobody going to say anything about Kyrie Stomping 'Lucky'?" Garnett wrote. "We just gonna act like we didn't see that," he continued.

"... You can't do that. That's not cool on no level .. All of us need to be better frfr."

The gesture sparked immediate outrage from those in attendance, with one fan - who was later arrested and charged with assault and battery with a deadly weapon - throwing a water bottle at Irving.

"[It’s] just underlying racism, and treating people like they’re in a human zoo,” Irving said after the bottle was thrown at him.

"It’s nothing new when I come into this building what it’s going to be like – but it’s the same energy they have for me, I’m going to have the same energy for them."

"There’s only but so much you take as a competitor," he went on. "We’re the ones expected to be docile and be humble, take a humble approach, f*** that, it’s the playoffs. This is what it is … So if somebody’s going to call me out on my name, I’m gonna look at them straight in the eye and see if they really ‘bout it. Most of the time they’re not."

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“Embrace it,” Irving said of the hostile crowd. “Embrace it. It’s the dark side. Embrace it.”

It remains to be seen if the passage of time has calmed Boston's ill-will towards Kyrie.

Celtics fans are a passionate and unforgiving bunch who don't easily forget such personal attacks.

But for the new, mature Kyrie, what's done is done, and he says he feels no animosity towards his former team.

After putting down the Wolves, the 32-year-old revealed he was in a dark place, due to off-court issues, when he wore the famous green and white.

Now, he feels ready to face them as a different person and player.

“I am at a place in my life where I don’t consider those past moments," he told reporters.

"I was able to unpack them in a healthy way, move forward as a person. I had a rough time there when I was in Boston, just dealing with a death in my family and off-court stuff I wasn’t ready to handle.”

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“Now that I am in a great place to be able to vocalize how I’m feeling, I’m ready to go back into Boston and have fun with my teammates. I know we’re going to be locked in and we’re going against a great Boston team that has earned their way to the NBA Finals. I see them as a formidable opponent, an honest opponent, and we’re going to see the best team win.”

Game 1 is set for Thursday, 6 June, in Boston.