The NBA Draft Lottery is Tuesday night, and your Boston Celtics have a chance at the No. 1 pick in the entire draft.

OK, you’ve heard this one before, right?

The Celtics? The NBA Draft Lottery? They go together like peanut butter and . . . blast furnace slag cement. Like Dean Martin and . . . Jerry Trupiano.

The NBA Draft Lottery has not been the Celtics’ friend. Quite the opposite. It has been the place where Green Dreams become nightmares. It has been Don Cherry sending too many skaters over the boards at the Montreal Forum. It has been a Mookie Wilson grounder to first base. It has been David Tyree pinning an Eli Manning pass to the side of his helmet.

The lottery is our sports oddity, because bad luck has not been a trademark of Boston’s fabled basketball franchise. The Celtics have gotten many lucky bounces since Red Auerbach’s brother Zang sketched the original ball-spinning leprechaun that serves as the official team logo.

Celtics founder Walter Brown pulled Bob Cousy’s name out of a hat to acquire the first great guard in NBA history. Frank Selvy’s wide-open shot — which would have won the championship for the Lakers — rimmed out at the old Garden, enabling the Celtics to win Game 7 in overtime in 1962. Seven years later, Don Nelson’s ridiculous foul-line jumper hit the back rim, bounced straight up in the air and back down through the basket to deliver Game 7 for the Celtics at the LA Forum.

But it’s a different story when it comes to the ping-pong balls that decide teams’ fates in the annual NBA Draft Lottery. The Celtics have been big-time lottery losers.

Ever seen the film “A Bronx Tale’’ with its famous character Eddie Mush? Eddie is a degenerate gambler who always loses. He got his name because, “everything he touches turns to mush.’’

The Celtics are the Eddie Mush of the NBA Draft Lottery. They bring the bad juju to the party.

The worst was the Celtics’ first venture into this contrived event. In 1986, the Celtics were the best team in NBA history and also had the second pick in the entire draft. That’s because Auerbach in 1984 had the brains to send Gerald Henderson to Seattle for the Sonics’ top pick two years down the road. Red went to the ’86 lottery and snagged the No. 2 spot with that pick. It appeared to be great fortune . . . right up until the Celtics drafted Len Bias and he died one day later of cocaine intoxication.

Remember 1997? It was a New England lottery nightmare. “Championship Driven’’ M.L. Carr drove the Green Team straight into a ditch, one of the great tank jobs of all time, bringing the Celtics across the finish line with a 15-67 record, easily the worst in franchise history.

Because they had multiple high picks, the Celtics had the best chance at the No. 1 pick, and we all knew that the No. 1 pick was going to be Tim Duncan of Wake Forest. This was such a lock that Rick Pitino left Kentucky and joined the Celtics before the lottery.

Unfortunately, as we have learned, the best chance is still not a good chance when it comes to the lottery. Even with a 15-win team and two of the first six picks, the Celtics still had only a 28 percent chance of getting the No. 1 pick.

With Carr representing Boston at the lottery event, the Celtics came away with the No. 3 and No. 6 picks, and a disappointed Pitino turned those into Chauncey Billups and Ron Mercer. Billups was traded after 51 games. Mercer lasted a year and a half. Pitino fled Boston in the middle of his fourth disastrous season. Duncan, meanwhile, wound up in San Antonio, where he has enjoyed a 19-year career and won five championships.

Fast-forward to 2007, when Tommy Heinsohn was selected to represent the Celtics on lottery night after a 24-58 tank-a-palooza season under the tutelage of Doc Rivers. The Celtics had a 19.9 percent chance at Kevin Durant in that one, but Tommy was not good luck, and Boston wound up with the No. 5 pick. The Celtics drafted Jeff Green and immediately traded him for Ray Allen.

This year, the Celtics have a 15.6 percent chance at the best pick, and that’s because they own the first-round pick of the Brooklyn Nets, who were brutal (21-61) in 2015-16. The Celtics have a 46.9 percent chance to come away with one of the top three picks. Boston’s All-Star guard Isaiah Thomas will sit on the stage, representing the Celtics in New York City.

In a back room, Celtics owner Wyc Grousbeck and a small Boston entourage will learn the team’s fate approximately 15 minutes before Thomas and the rest of the nation see the results during the ESPN telecast Tuesday at 8 p.m.

“It’s a strange feeling,’’ Grousbeck said last week. “We see the whole thing play out, but we can’t communicate it to anyone. We check our cellphones at the door.’’

Comcast SportsNet New England has planned a 90-minute special after the pick is announced, and it could be a sorry program if the Celtics’ buzzard luck prevails and the Green wind up with the No. 6 pick.

Here’s hoping the Celtics don’t get “mushed’’ again.

Dan Shaughnessy can be reached at daniel.shaughnessy@ globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @Dan_Shaughnessy