Gonzalez went toe-to-toe with one of his Boston Celtics teammates in a game between Portugal and Spain on Friday.
The Boston Celtics will be looking to regain their contender status in the Eastern Conference this offseason after suffering an unceremonious end to their season in the first round of the playoffs against archrivals, the Philadelphia 76ers.
Before the Celtics get into the full stretch of preseason work, several representatives of the franchise will be competing for their native country in the FIBA World Cup qualifying round, which is currently underway and will continue through mid-September.
Multiple Boston players competed in two World Cup qualifying games Friday.
Center Luka Garza put up 10 points for his native Bosnia and Herzegovina's 78-76 win against Italy on Friday.
In Portugal's 95-89 win over Spain on Friday, fellow Boston center Neemias Queta scored 16 points and had nine rebounds in over 24 minutes of play.
In Portugal and Spain's matchup, there was one more Celtics representative aside from Queta that played: guard Hugo Gonzalez, who suited up for Spain.
Gonzalez wasn't able to have as efficient an outing as his teammates, Garza and Queta. In 23 minutes, 27 seconds of play, Gonzalez scored three points on a 1-for-4 mark from the floor, which all came from 3-point range. He also pulled in four rebounds and dished an assist.
Gonzalez was selected by Boston with the 28th overall pick in the 2025 NBA Draft after three seasons overseas with Real Madrid, where he won the Liga ACB championship, the top division of Spanish basketball, twice (2024-25).
The 6-foot-6 shooting guard saw limited action his rookie year with the Celtics despite appearing in the majority of games.
Gonzalez played in 74 games (three starts) for Boston last season. He averaged 14.6 minutes per game and averaged 3.9 minutes per game on 47.6% shooting from the floor (36.2% from 3-point range). He also averaged 3.3 rebounds per contest.
Despite his low amount of minutes and scoring output, the Celtics playing Gonzalez in that many games shows the team's view of him as a valuable role player.
Due to Gonzalez's ability to play the wing, and the team's offseason trade of Jaylen Brown will likely carve out a significant amount of minutes for the Spaniard. His ability to stretch the floor will likely provide a lot of opportunities inside for the team's frontcourt players, including Queta, Garza and offseason signing Mitchell Robinson.
Boston will begin its regular season against the Detroit Pistons at 3 p.m. ET on Oct. 20 at Little Caesars Arena in Detroit.
