Luka Garza lined up to participate in the three-quarter sprint at the 2021 NBA Draft Combine with scouts and executives from every team watching him. The 6-foot-10 big man had spent months training for this moment, losing 30 pounds from his college season with the hopes of increasing his footspeed. After years of three-a-day training sessions, mental visualizations, and dominating every opponent that he faced in college, seventy-five feet stood between him and his dream of being drafted in the NBA.
Garza took off between the dotted-blue lane lines, swinging his arms and giving his all. Fifty-eight players ran that day. When Garza crossed the finish line, his time came in at No. 58.
Garza was the best player in college basketball as a junior and senior at Iowa, leading the nation in scoring during each of those years. Garzilla was an unstoppable force down low, combining brute force with great technique and touch.
MORE: Iowa's Luka Garza is SN's first repeat Player of the Year since Michael Jordan
What stood out to NBA scouts though, and loudly at that, was his lone failure. On draft night, Garza heard 51 players taken ahead of him. None of them came close to his 747 points scored during that college season, or his consensus Player of the Year status. None posted a 3.51-second three-quarter sprint either.
He’s too slow. His post game won’t translate. He’s not an NBA player.
Garza heard it all. His father, Frank received messages on social media about how the Pistons had wasted their draft pick on a player who had no chance of succeeding.
Four years later, Garza has proved those critics wrong. He’s been one of the Celtics’ most important role players, helping to solidify a center rotation that was supposed to be their biggest weakness.
The Celtics are one of the league's biggest surprises, finding themselves in second place in the East after 41 games. Garza has carved out a key role as the first big man off the bench. He has almost as many minutes this season (546) as he did in the previous three seasons combined with the Timberwolves (584).
Garza's modest 7.5 points per game this season don't necessarily jump off the page. Look deeper though, and it's understandable why he's earned the trust of coach Joe Mazzulla. Garza leads the team with 48.9 percent shooting from 3 and a stellar 71.8 true shooting percentage. He never takes bad shots. His 20.6 Player Efficiency Rating (PER) is behind only Jaylen Brown on the team. And that box score metric doesn't even begin to capture the hustle plays that he has become known for.
"He’s been really good for us," Mazzulla told AllSportsPeople, pointing to Garza’s shooting, scoring, rebounding, and screening.
Garza couldn’t do much about his speed. Instead, he changed what he could control. That determination has gotten him to where he is today.
Garza's career numbers
| Seasons 1-4 (per game) | Season 5 | |
| Games | 31 | 33 |
| Minutes | 7.8 | 16.5 |
| Points | 4.9 | 7.5 |
| Rebounds | 2.0 | 4.3 |
| FG% | 49.0% | 61.2% |
| 3FG% | 31.4% | 48.9% |
NBA POWER RANKINGS: Surprising Celtics on the rise
Luka Garza's transformation from Pudge to NBA player
Once upon a time, Garza was a chubby kid nicknamed Pudge. These days, he's at 250 pounds and has gotten his body fat as low as six percent throughout the course of the season.
Garza’s game is almost as unrecognizable as his body. During his senior year, he was the focal point of an Iowa offense ranked No. 3 in the nation. He averaged a healthy 9.7 post ups per game.
He’s had four total through the first half of the year for the Celtics.
Garza was the most decorated college player of his class, perfecting his craft by studying legends of the past. Growing up, he pored through old VHS tapes of superstars like Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Kevin McHale, and Hakeem Olajuwon. Nobody put more work in than him at becoming an old school post-up master.
It took great humility to give that part of his game up.
"Obviously, I love playing in the post. I will always love playing in the post. Any opportunity I get in there, I'm going to try to," Garza said. "But the role I have on this team emphasizes my screening, my ability to stretch the floor, crashing the glass. And having a role and being able to impact winning is amazing. I wouldn't trade it for anything."
Garza may have shelved his dominant post game, but he still has that terrific footwork in the paint. Anthony Edwards credited his former Wolves teammate for teaching him how to use an innovative tweak to his deceleration step.
MORE: Celtics' Luka Garza shows off move he taught to Anthony Edwards
"I kind of put my own spin on it. Stopping, and then shot faking on the second step," Garza told SN. "Not many people had done that at that point, and I think that's what Ant saw.
"That's the common trait among all great players, is being able to look at other people, no matter who it is and taking something from it. It's all I was doing the last four years, watching guys while not playing."
Along with adding to his bag, Garza knew that priority No. 1 was to improve his 3-pointer. So he kept shooting again, and again, and again. Last season, he recorded 42,000 shots in the league-wide Noah Basketball tracking system, as reported in a fantastic profile by Noa Dalzell for CelticsBlog. That was the highest total from an NBA player by about 12,000 shots.
Garza did show good touch in college, hitting on 37 percent of his attempts at Iowa on low volume. But nobody expected him to be hitting 49 percent of his 3’s for the Celtics at the halfway point of the regular season. Well, almost nobody.
I knew https://t.co/AHfQcWAd2n
— Caitlin Clark (@CaitlinClark22) January 11, 2026
"Caitlin has always had a lot of confidence in me, and vice versa," Garza said of his fellow Hawkeye.
When asked who was the better shooter, Garza smiled and said, "I'm always going to take myself over anybody, but she's one of the best I've ever seen."
Along with drilling his 3's, Garza has become the king of doing the dirty work. Of the 268 players this year with at least 500 minutes played, he ranks No. 2 in the league in screen assists and No. 5 in box outs per minute. He leads the team in percentage of offensive loose balls recovered. He’s become a monster on the offensive glass, often going through two or three defenders to find the ball.
"Garza is like a bowling ball and the Pacers are pins, commentator Brian Scalabrine noted during one of his recent rebounds.
"Let the bodies hit the floor"
— Danielle Hobeika (@DanielleHobeika) December 23, 2025
"Luka Garza is like a bowling ball and the Pacers are pins" pic.twitter.com/hXlia2iC6F
Garza saw his path to success the whole way.
"I know every guy in the NBA can beat me in a 3/4 court sprint," he told The Athletic’s James Edwards during his Summer League debut back in 2021. "I know that. But is everyone going to run that hard in the game? No. But I'm going to."
Garza has made true on that promise. He might have the slowest top speed on the roster, but his average speed of 4.7 miles per hour on the floor is the fastest on the team. He is always moving.
"You know when I get on the floor, I'm going to be sprinting. Normal guys in the league, a lot of them are jogging," Garza said.
Garza even runs during timeouts, doing wind sprints while the other nine players stand around waiting for the whistle to blow. He explained that when he checks in, he needs to play like he's hopping on a treadmill that's going 100 miles per hour.
Garza brings that same energy on the defensive end. He’s the only player I’ve ever seen who practices 1-on-1 defense during warmups, going against assistant coach Da'Sean Butler over and over before every Celtics game.
Not everyone sees that level of dedication. It's what teams missed during that 2021 draft. Those close to him know though that it's the quality that defines him most.
"If someone ever tells him that he can’t do something, he’s going to work as hard as he can to make sure that gets fixed," Mazzulla said. "That’s who he is."