Wyc Grousbeck says Al Horford will be back next season

It would be more than understandable if Al Horford chose to ride off into the sunset this summer after finally winning his first NBA championship at age 38. That won't be the case, though, at least not this year.

Celtics owner and governor Wyc Grousbeck joined The Greg Hill Show Tuesday morning after Boston captured its 18th NBA title and said that Horford is planning to return for an 18th season, and his seventh in Boston. Listen to the full interview above.

"Al is coming back for next year," Grousbeck said. "That's what I've been told."

"Ironically, we won in '08 over Al's team," Grousbeck added. "The Hawks took us to seven in the first round. So, we were part of his drought, and now he came home to us. He loves it here. He and his family love it here. He couldn't be happier, and we are also happy to have him."

With the Celtics acquiring Kristaps Porzingis last offseason, Horford came off the bench for the first time in his career, although he did still start 33 games in the regular season. With Porzingis missing time due to two different injuries in the playoffs, Horford ended up starting 15 of 19 playoff games, averaging 9.2 points and 7.0 rebounds while playing 30 minutes per game.

Grousbeck said Horford was one of the many examples of these players wanting to win as a team and not worrying about maximizing their individual stats.

"The guys wanted to make it work," Grousbeck said. "That's the first part. They're brilliant. They think everything through and they see the point. They took the coaching from Joe [Mazzulla], and Joe said there's no expectations. There's no, ‘Oh, of course we're gonna win this game because we're favored by 10 or 15 or whatever.’ No, that's not the way it works. And I'm really happy for Joe. Joe, Jayson [Tatum] and Jaylen [Brown] have taken a lot of heat from a lot of people that if they were building a basketball team, I don’t know if they’d win 10 games. So, we'll turn that page and we'll have our parade."

As for that parade, Grousbeck confirmed that it will take place on Friday in Boston after a team vacation/celebration, which is reportedly a trip to Miami.