Neemias Queta Leads Portugal to Historic Win Against Spain
Spain walked into this World Cup qualifier as the heavyweight, Portugal as the footnote. On paper, it was supposed to be routine. A 12.5-point spread, a roster stacked with NBA pedigree, and a history that screamed imbalance.
Then Neemias Queta tore up the script.
Spain, boasting rising second-year wing Hugo Gonzalez and former Celtic Juancho Hernangomez among six players with NBA ties, carried all the status and all the expectation. This is the program widely regarded as the second-best basketball nation on the planet behind the U.S., a machine that rarely stumbles in these spots.
Portugal had one NBA player. One. The backup center from Boston.
They beat Spain anyway.
The 95-89 win marked Portugal’s first-ever tournament victory over Spain, a seismic result for a national team that has spent most of its history on the game’s periphery. It lifted Portugal to 4-3 in qualifying and kept alive the dream of a first World Cup appearance — a dream that, suddenly, no longer feels fanciful.
At the center of it all stood Queta, growing as fast as the team he now leads.
Queta’s Statement Night
Queta didn’t dominate from the opening tip. He built his game, possession by possession, then took over when it mattered most.
He finished with 16 points on 5-for-10 shooting and nine rebounds, but the box score only hints at his impact. His second half tilted the floor. He controlled the glass, punished mismatches, and gave Portugal a physical presence that Spain never fully solved.
For a country that only returned to EuroBasket last year for the first time since 2011 — and just the fourth time in its history — this is new territory. For Queta, it’s exactly where he believes he should be.
“It’s a growing thing,” he told Eurohoops. “We’re getting so much better as a country in the sport. So, I feel like it’s only fitting that I keep on getting better, too. So, I just want to be out here competing my best and live with the results.”
The results, right now, are historic.
A New Contract, New Demands in Boston
Queta doesn’t head back to the Celtics as a feel-good story. He returns as an investment.
Boston handed the 7-footer his first major NBA deal this offseason: a four-year, $56 million extension that kicks in after this year. For a player who once bounced between benches and G League gyms in Sacramento and Boston, it’s a sharp turn in his career arc.
He earned it with a genuine breakout season. Queta averaged 10.2 points and 8.4 rebounds in 76 games, starting 75 of them. Before that? Just 48 appearances across his first three years in the league.
Now the contract changes the conversation. Production is no longer a pleasant surprise; it’s the baseline. The Celtics want more.
Last spring’s collapse against the Sixers still lingers. Boston blew a 3-1 series lead, and in the postmortem, team president Brad Stevens didn’t shy away from pointing at the center spot — and at Queta’s struggles protecting the rim, particularly against Joel Embiid.
“To be honest, one of the things with Neemi was just figuring out how to keep him on the floor,” Stevens said. “Because he had two games where he’s off the floor in four minutes.”
That’s the gap between his national-team dominance and his NBA reality. In Portugal’s colors, he’s the anchor. In Boston’s, he’s still proving he can be the answer in May and June.
Mitchell Robinson and the Battle at Center
The Celtics didn’t wait around to see if internal growth alone would fix their issues in the paint. They went shopping.
Mitchell Robinson arrived from New York with a reputation as one of the league’s best offensive rebounders and an imposing interior defender. When Stevens talked about needing more impact at the rim and hinted he might have to look elsewhere to find it, Robinson was the response.
That signing turns Queta’s role into a competition. His starting spot is no longer guaranteed, not after Boston brought in a center whose calling card is exactly what the team felt it lacked.
But this isn’t a closed door. Robinson has battled injuries throughout his career, and the Celtics know they’ll need depth, size, and fouls across a long season and a longer postseason.
For Queta, the message is clear: keep climbing. The extension buys him time, not comfort. Performances like the one against Spain show what he can be when the game slows down for him and the stage doesn’t shrink his confidence.
Portugal will lean on that version of Queta again on Monday, when they face Georgia — also 4-3 — in a game that feels like a knockout even if the math doesn’t quite say so yet. It’s a must-win, a test of whether this Spanish upset was a one-off shock or the start of something bigger.
For Portugal, it’s a chance to edge closer to a first World Cup.
For Neemias Queta, it’s another night to prove that what he’s becoming on the international stage can’t be ignored in Boston much longer.
