C’s Waters carries on
Stays, plays to honor late father
LAS VEGAS — Tremont Waters wrote three messages in black marker along the bottom of his right sneaker yesterday.
“July 11, 2019, EBW II,” and “Team Waters! Waters Way!”
This was how the Celtics rookie guard honored his father, Edward, who was found dead in a West Haven, Conn., motel room on Thursday night. Waters played that night in a win over Memphis knowing his father had just died, in what authorities ruled a suicide.
His family, in a showing of support, flew to Las Vegas to be with him yesterday, when the Celtics were eliminated in the summer league quarterfinals by the Grizzlies.
Waters once spoke in admiration of how Isaiah Thomas played to honor his sister Chyna in the 2017 playoffs, and chose to honor his father in a similar way.
“First of all, he has some family here, so he has a good support system here from his home side and the Celtics side,” Celtics assistant coach Scott Morrison said. “From the top down everyone has offered to do as much as they can to help him, and that’s a lot more important than summer league basketball. But it was his choice to stay and play — that’s how he wanted to deal with it. Not that it’s important, but I thought he played great under all of those considerations. He’s got a bright future, and we’re here to do whatever we can to help him.”
Team Waters is what the Celtics guard and his New Haven-based family called themselves. Edward and Vanessa Waters sat with their son at the press conference when he announced his plan to attend LSU, and were with him in the Barclays Center the night the Celtics drafted him on June 20.
His teammates, while giving him all of the support they could, admitted they had no idea of the pain Waters was feeling.
“No one can ever describe what it feels like to lose your father until it actually happens, so honestly for us we just did what we could to console him,” said Grant Williams. “It’s a shame we didn’t get the win, but I feel that you can only do so much at this time.”
Said Carsen Edwards: “Just be there for him, really. Personally I can’t put myself in his shoes, and understand where he’s coming from. Just be there for him. If he needs space give him space, if he needs someone to talk to and listen to him, just be
there, really. My main thing was to be there for him, for whatever he needs.”
Waters played a team-high 32 minutes and finished with 16 points, three assists and two steals. Basketball was a refuge for him.
“Can’t speak from personal experience in that situation, but from experience as a basketball player, when it’s your whole life, it’s what you turn to sometimes when things get rough,” Morrison said. “If that’s why he chose to do it, I can’t speak for him, but definitely it was a viable option.”