The Boston Celtics NBA basketball team has reached an agreement to continue playing at the TD Garden arena until at least 2036.
A spokesperson for the arena told the Sportico website that a new 15-year deal has been agreed between the Celtics and arena owner Delaware North. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
The Celtics share TD Garden with NHL ice hockey franchise the Boston Bruins. Both teams have played at the arena since it opened in 1995.
Speaking during a Sportico event on Tuesday, Celtics owner Wyc Grousbeck said the team had built a “real partnership” with the Jacobs family, which owns Delaware North, adding: “This is where we’re going to stay.”
The Celtics’ previous 15-year lease had been due to expire at the end of the current NBA season, but the new deal confirms the team’s future at the arena.
TD Garden recently underwent extensive renovation work worth $100m (£72.9m/€82.4m). Delaware North announced the plans in November 2018 and the work was finalised during the 2019-20 NBA season.
The private investment by the Jacobs family provided a combined 50,000 square feet of additional space on all levels of the arena, with new seating and innovative viewing options having been put in place.
A new seating space, Rafters, is one of the standout features and includes approximately 400 cantilever seats around the arena bowl. The arena bowl’s all-yellow seating, originally installed in 1995, was also replaced and in December 2019 the venue was fitted with a 2.5-millimetre centre-hung screen courtesy of Daktronics.
At the time, Daktronics said the installation marked the tightest pixel pitch on a centre-hung display in professional sport.
Image: Benoît Prieur/CC BY-SA 3.0/Edited for size
