MAVS ARE THE CHAMPIONS
(Image taken from NBA)
The 2011 NBA Finals between the Heat and the Mavs and the season as a whole was reaching its climax. The season opened up with the Heat winning 92-84 in Miami in Game 1. Then the Mavs took homecourt advantage by winning Game 2 95-93. When the show switched to Dallas though, the Heat retook homecourt advantage by winning Game 3 88-86. The Mavs replied by winning Game 4 86-83, making the series a three gamer. After that, came a 112-103 win in Game 5, which gave the Mavs the series lead and made this the first time they'd won three Finals game in one season since the franchise started up in 1980! Now though, the show returned to Miami, for Game 6 and what was to be the Heat's last stand. Plenty of Mavs fans had travelled over from Dallas though, hoping to see their team claim the title.
Well the Heat opened the scoring with a three pointer and looked desperate to show the Mavs whose house they were in, before the Mavs came back to tie the game. The Mavs then took their first lead of the game before the Heat came back to surge into a a 20-11 lead with 6:19 left in the 1st quarter. Then the Mavs took a bite into their lead. The Heat recovered. The Mavs surged again though and this time were able to duel for the lead. The Mavs not only won that duel it was like the early Heat superiority had just never happened. Jason Terry led the way with 9 points. Mavs led 32-27 at the first buzzer and the Heat needed to find a second wind already.
In the early stages of the 2nd quarter that second wind for the Heat was not forthcoming as the Mavs lead hit double digits. The Heat got themselves back on the road with a three pointer though and then their comeback charge was on, eventually allowing them to retake the lead. The Heat went on to retain the advantage for a while, and while they weren't running away with the game, a 47-43 lead with 3:56 left in the half was nothing to complain about. Yet the Mavs retook the lead with another three pointer and then the Heat were smothered and weren't able to turn the game back around. Terry was on 19 points, DeShawn Stevenson backing him up with 9. Mavs led 53-51 at the half.
The Mavs opened the scoring in the 3rd quarter but the Heat weren't done and took a 56-55 lead with 10:56 left in the period before the Mavs come back and went on another run. After that, the Heat weren't treading water for a period and didn't look like turning the game round again. As the quarter went on though, well the Mavs weren't quite running away with the game but they certainly had the home side held down. The Heat didn't put up much resistance in the back end of the quarter either. By that point Terry was on 21 points with Shaun Marion backing him up on 12 points. Mavs led 81-72 and surely the Heat weren't going to throw away the title here?
Well they didn't look like the home side were in the mood to white flag early in the 4th quarter, cutting the gap to four with just over ten and a half minutes left in the game. The Mavs recovered from that though and the gap hit double digits once again. Once again the Heat attempted to hit the comeback trail but their shooters were panicing and overcooking their shots half the time, effectively meaning that they weren't doing much more than tread water. Of course that was never going to be anywhere near good enough and as the clock ran down the Heat fans could see the writing on the wall. Terry finished with 27 points, Dirk Nowitski backing him up with 21. Mavs won the game 105-95 and the series 4-2.
So, all hail the Dallas Mavericks, the 2011 NBA champions and a team who have won the title for the first time since they started up back in 1980. When I first got into the NBA back in the mid-90s this team was nowhere, then in '98 they drafted a certain young German called Dirk Nowitski. In '01 I did a German A Level essay talking about German basketball during which I compared Nowitski to Detlef Schrempf, veteran of the '96 finals. I suggested that Nowitski had the potential to be better than Schrempf and that Allstar Games would surely be in his future. Sure enough, he's gone on to play in every Allstar Game since I wrote that essay.
One thing I didn't even mention though was the possibility of winning an NBA title because surely he wouldn't even make the Finals with the Mavs. Well in '06 he did just that, only for his crew to, predictably come up short against the Shaq-era Heat. Surely that would be it though, particularly this season no one in their right mind were picking the Mavs to win the title...and then they swept, yes swept the defending champion Lakers. The number 1 seeded Spurs had already been mugged and so it looked as though the Mavs would return to the Finals for a rematch of the '06 series with the Heat. Which they did, and yet the Heat were a team that were finally clicking...in the Finals though, well you don't expect the best individual player in the NBA to just freeze like that.
It happened though, but if the Mavs were going to win the title then only one man fwas going to be Finals MVP. Dirk Nowitski, making him the first European to claim the award since Tony Parker won it in '07. Parker was never the leader of that '07 Spurs team though, certainly not it's undisputed leader. Even back in '06 though, the Mavs were very much Nowitski's team, fastforward five years and that hasn't changed. He is the first European to truly lead a team to an NBA title. Forget being better than Schrempf, surely that makes him the best European NBA player of all time.
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