BOSTON - Doc Rivers and the Boston Celtics will likely trim the team's roster to 14 players from 17 before the start of the regular season, the team's head coach told reporters following Boston's 81-73 win over Toronto in the preseason finale on Wednesday night at TD Garden.
"Not yet," Rivers said when asked if the team had made any roster decisions after Wednesday's game. "We've made a couple but we haven't announced them or done anything yet. It'd be really nice to tell the guy first.
"There's guys still out there unsigned and we're going to want to sign one of them. We're looking around. I still think there will be buyouts, probably starting [Thursday]. There's so many things that can happen and we want to make sure, if that happens, we're able to do it quick instead of delayed. We may keep 15 for a couple more days, but after that we're going to probably go to 14."
Michael Sweetney, Jamal Sampson and Gilbert Brown are the three players who will likely be cut over the next few days. Brown and Sampson did not speak to the media following the preseason finale, but Sampson was seen walking out of a side room in the locker room with GM Danny Ainge and appeared depressed after the game.
Greg Stiemsma, a former NBA D-League player, was invited to Celtics camp and has likely made enough of an impact to stick around with the team, for now. Stiemsma scored seven points and had five rebounds and two blocks in 18 minutes.
"He played great. It was good to see," Rivers said about Stiemsma. "It was nice because we played him with some of the starters, which we were trying to do. He can block shots, he can run the floor, he can make the shot from the elbow. That was great when he just jacked it. That was what we wanted him to do. It was a good showing by him."
Boston will another practice at 1 p.m. EDT on Thursday in preparation for the season opener.
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