![\"Neemias](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/GettyImages-1728065980-e1757328019738.jpg\")
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tPhoto by Sarah Stier\/Getty Images\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
Neemias Queta, Boston Celtics<\/p>\n
Neemias Queta<\/a> is heading into arguably the most important season of his career. The 7-foot rim-runner is expected to become the Boston Celtics\u2019<\/a> starting big man.<\/p>\n Brad Stevens has overseen a talent drain in the front court. Al Horford<\/a>, Kristaps Porzingis<\/a> and Luke Kornet<\/a> all leaving the franchise. As such, Queta has a golden opportunity to prove himself at the NBA level.<\/p>\n Queta has spent the past few weeks in Europe, playing for the Portuguese national team at the FIBA EuroBasket. The big man thrived as a featured member of Portugal\u2019s offense, leading the team to the knockout stages of the tournament.<\/p>\n In six games, Queta averaged 15.5 points, 8 rebounds and 1.7 blocks per game. Unfortunately, Germany eliminated Portugal 85-58.<\/p>\n When speaking to EuroHoops\u2019 Cesare Milanti, Queta shared the support head coach Joe Mazzulla has been providing throughout the summer.<\/p>\n \u201cI spoke with him a couple of times; he is always sending me messages of appreciation, or love, or me getting better,\u201d Queta said. \u201cWhat he sees in me, what I need to improve on, and that\u2019s a great relationship that we have\u2026It (EuroBasket) was a good opportunity for me to evolve my game and get ready for the next season\u2026I got rested enough this offseason, and I think that I put myself in the best position to have a breakout season. I have the tools to compete with the best.\u201d<\/p>\n Queta will face competition for a starting spot from Luka Garza, Chris Boucher and Xavier Tillman next season.<\/p>\n Celtics Derrick White\u2019 Shares Thoughts on Queta<\/p>\n During a recent episode of the \u201cWhite Noise\u201d podcast, Celtics guard\u00a0Derrick White<\/a>\u00a0shared his thoughts on Queta receiving an expanded role.<\/p>\n \u201cI think Joe has always been super hard on him for the last couple of years to prepare him for something like this,\u201d White said. \u201cObviously, he\u2019s going to have to have a big year, and we\u2019re going to ask a lot out of him, which is exciting\u2026 He\u2019s a guy who works hard, competes at a high level, and is just continuing to learn what works and what doesn\u2019t in the NBA.\u201d<\/p>\n White continued.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re super excited for Neemias\u2026 I\u2019m a big fan; he\u2019s had so many different moments in these last two years. He\u2019s helped us win games, or he\u2019s changed the momentum of a game. It\u2019s a big role for him.\u201d<\/p>\n Queta played in 62 regular-season games in 2024-25. He averaged 5 points and 3.8 rebounds. However, with a bigger role on the horizon, it will be interesting to see how he scales his production.<\/p>\n Porzingis Backs Queta to Shine For Celtics<\/p>\n Kristaps Porzingis<\/a> has also thrown his support behind Queta<\/a>. The two went toe-to-toe at the EuroBasket tournament.<\/p>\n \u201cNeemy has been getting better every year,\u201d Porzingis said. \u201cCoach Mazzulla has been pretty tough on him, and I believe he\u2019s getting to a point where he deserves some real minutes, real rotation minutes. He\u2019s been putting in the work, and you can see it in how he\u2019s playing now in this tournament. I\u2019m happy for Neemy. He\u2019s a great dude, really cool person. He puts in the time, he puts in the work, and I\u2019ll be glad to see him get a lot more minutes this year.\u201d<\/p>\n Still, thriving in Europe is different to thriving in the NBA. Therefore, Queta will still need to prove himself for the Celtics. Fortunately for him, he will get every opportunity to showcase his skill set.<\/p>\n However, Celtics fans should have realistic expectations. Therefore, Queta may need some time to adjust to his new role. Hopefully, once he\u2019s adjusted, he will prove he\u2019s capable of being a starting-level NBA center.<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tAdam Taylor<\/a> is a basketball reporter covering the Boston Celtics and Phoenix Suns for Heavy. He has also written for CelticsBlog, USA Today, Yardbarker and FanSided. Adam has a bachelor\u2019s degree in creative writing from Open University. More about Adam Taylor<\/a>\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tMore Heavy on Celtics\n\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\t\tLoading more stories\n\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Photo by Sarah Stier\/Getty Images Neemias Queta, Boston Celtics Neemias Queta is heading into arguably the most important…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":128978,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,85],"class_list":["post-128977","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-basketball","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-basketball","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128977","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=128977"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128977\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/128978"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=128977"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=128977"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=128977"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}