qm22 wrote:Jonny Blaze wrote:
How the hell do you beat a team 6 out of 8 times including 3 out of 4 on their home court if you are not the better team?
Seriously.
I recently rewatched the entire 2011 NBA Finals. The Mavs won that series because they were a better team than the Miami Heat.
Miami ran out of gas during the 4th quarter of Game 4 and never recovered.....very similar to how a 800m track and field runner might get passed in the last 200m of a race after leading the first 600 meters.
The Mavs were able to do this because they were a much deeper team with better depth.
Isn't an 8 game sample enough to figure out which team is better? Isn't that the whole point of playing the games....to see who is better?
The only wins by double digits I see are by the Mavs....while both of the Heat wins were relatively close games.
(Dallas) Game 1: Mavs 106 Heat 95
(Miami) Game 2: Mavs 98 Heat 96
(Miami) Game 3: Heat 92 Mavs 84
(Miami) Game 4: Mavs 95 Heat 93
(Dallas) Game 5: Heat 88 Mavs 86
(Dallas) Game 6: Mavs 86 Heat 83
(Dallas) Game 7: Mavs 112 Heat 103
(Miami) Game 8: Mavs 105 Heat 95
I'm not going to say anything about the regular season. The Mavs were the better team because they won, that's pretty self-explanatory. But it's fair to question if Miami could have managed a different outcome if they had played things differently. Especially games 2 and 4.
Game 2 they were up by 15 with 7:30 to go and only score 2 more points in the next 7 minutes. LeBron was fatigued, taken out of his game by the Mavs, or had some really weird meltdown.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HxAL3lzwsbUYou can see in game 2 (or 4 since you're counting from RS games) he has some horrible offense to manage the lead. He goes away from Wade, takes some bad long distance shots leading to fast breaks, and was responsible for defensive breakdowns on 4 of the other possessions. He was mentally out of it from what I can tell (saying my bad while watching a 3 go up and patting his chest rather than worrying about the play not being over since it hadn't gone in). In game 4 he only had 8 points. Someone of LeBron's caliber should have not had trouble (famously) not being able to back down Jason Kidd in the post. It was probably the strangest series of LeBron's career.
Since it was somewhat close it isn't unreasonable to be curious if Miami had a shot to win if they played a bit differently, rather than saying it is a black and white situation of Dallas being way out of Miami's reach.
I can also play that game.
Do you realize that if Chris Bosh misses that jumper he hit at the end of Finals game 3 and Dirk hits the shot that he missed at the end of the game ......that the Mavs win the NBA Finals 4 games to 1.
Yes the series was close.....but the better team prevailed.
Miami didn't have any double digit victory against the Mavs.
The Mavs have an 11 point victory, a 10 point victory and a 9 point victory.
If you play a team 4 times on their home court and you beat them 3 times....(with two of them being by double digits) than you are the better basketball team.......
PERIOD. I'm not going to say anything about the regular season. The Mavs were the better team because they won, that's pretty self-explanatory. But it's fair to question if Miami could have managed a different outcome if they had played things differently. Especially games 2 and 4.
Game 2 they were up by 15 with 7:30 to go and only score 2 more points in the next 7 minutes. LeBron was fatigued, taken out of his game by the Mavs, or had some really weird meltdown.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HxAL3lzwsbU
NBA Finals game 2 was a close game for the entire game until the 4th quarter. Miami is up 2 points and then the Heat go on a 13-0 run to start the 4th quarter to go up 15.
The Mavs then match the Heat run with a 22-5 run to end the game.
Do you wanna know you go on a 22-5 run to end game 2, or how you hold the Heat to 14 points in the 4th quarter of Game 4?
You do it by playing some serious, serious defense.
Its not dumb luck, or Lebron not trying.
Its having a defensive strategy and sticking to it.
Do you watch boxing? If you do, you might be familiar with this analogy.
How many times have you seen a boxer kick ass in the first 5 or 6 rounds, but run out of gas in the later rounds of the fight and lose?
Miami ran out of gas in the 4th quarter of Game 4 of the 2011 NBA Finals.
Against a lesser team like Boston or Chicago they would have probably already been up 3-1....but against a much deeper team....the Mavs depth help them pull away from the Heat in Games 4, 5 and 6.