A Heart-Stopping Finish

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I seldom watch the NBA — until the playoffs begin. And, even then, I don't usually watch until it has been narrowed down to two teams.

But, yesterday, I sat down and watched most (not all) of Game 3 of the Dallas Mavericks–San Antonio Spurs series.

The Spurs are the top seed in the west; the Mavericks are the eighth seed. It is safe to say most regular NBA observers probably expected the Spurs to win the series fairly easily, especially after winning the first game at home.

But the Mavericks surprised them by winning the second game, and the series moved to Dallas.

You don't have to be an NBA fan to know that these two teams have a pretty intense in–state rivalry going on. I guess it helps to be a resident of Texas — but even that probably isn't necessary.

Anyway, I decided to watch most of yesterday's game.

At first, it appeared the Spurs would seize the series lead. They grabbed a seven–point advantage at the end of the first quarter, but the Mavericks pounded them in the second and led by five points at intermission.

I had my TV on throughout the first half, but I was busy doing things around the apartment so I didn't sit and watch — until the second half began.

That second half was incredible. The Spurs picked up a couple of points on the Mavericks in the third quarter and battled to a two–point lead with 1.7 seconds remaining. It appeared the Mavericks would lose.

But then they inbounded the ball to Vince Carter, who hit a jumper from the corner. Two questions had to be answered: Did he shoot before time expired? If so, did he shoot from three–point range?

There was no question about whether he made the shot. The question was whether he fired it before time ran out. If he did, then the question was whether it was worth two points (which would mean an overtime period) or three (which would mean the Mavericks won).

The referees, after consulting instant replay, confirmed that the ball left Carter's hands before time expired, then they ruled that he shot from three–point range.

Game over.

Tim Cowlishaw of the Dallas Morning News never seems to be at a loss for words, even if he has to make them up (as William Shakespeare did). That can be a hit–or–miss kind of thing for a journalist, but, as a veteran of sports desks, I know that sports may be the best place for someone who has a way with words to be.

It is part of the joy of sports, which was best described, I think, by Red Smith who, as I have observed on this blog before, wrote that he believed people watched sports events to have fun — and then they picked up the next day's paper to read about the event they had watched and have fun all over again.

Sportswriters (and I include headline writers in this) get into the spirit of whichever sport is in season, and they contribute a great deal to the mood.

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When people read accounts of yesterday's game, the memory that most will have is of the bedlam that followed the referees' ruling, and I have to concede that the word Cowlishaw used to describe the pandemonium — "Vinsanity" — was pretty good.

Actually, though, that isn't Cowlishaw's creation. Carter isn't a rookie. He is 37 years old. "Vinsanity" may go back to his college days, for all I know.

Judging from Gil LeBreton's column in the Fort Worth Star–Telegram, it is old enough to be Vinsanity 2.0.

"Or maybe," he wrote, "considering the many NBA lives of 37–year–old Vince Carter, it was Vinsanity 4, 5 or 6.0 that erupted as the final horn sounded."

Well, it still summarized the finish pretty well — although whoever wrote the headline for Cowlishaw may have been more on track with the reference to "Monta Madness."

Monta is Monta Ellis, who led all scorers with 29 points.

Game 4 will be here in Dallas tomorrow night at 8:30 (Central), and Game 5 will be played in San Antonio Wednesday. I'll be watching.

Dallas Is Title Town Again

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The NBA season is over — and, for a football fan like me, that is good news. It means we are that much closer to autumn.

I don't know if the NFL will resolve its issues and proceed as planned with the 2011 season. I am primarily a college football fan, anyway, so I know that my Saturdays, at least, will be unaffected.

As long as I can remember, football has been king in Texas. I didn't grow up here, but my parents did, and my father has always been a football fan. As nearly as I can tell, football hasn't been replaced at the top of the list of the public's affections — but you could probably get some arguments on that around here today.

Last night, the Dallas Mavericks won their first–ever NBA title.

There are all sorts of ironies in that, I guess.

When I was growing up, there was only one professional sports team in Dallas — the Dallas Cowboys. And they were known, for many years, for not being able to "win the big one." They finally did win it all, of course, but not until after other teams arrived and began carving out their niches in the local sports market.

The Mavericks came into existence in 1980. Of the major sports franchises in the Dallas–Fort Worth Metroplex, its tenure here has been the shortest — except for the Dallas Stars, a hockey team that moved here from Minnesota.

And yet, until last night, that hockey team had brought the only championship to Dallas in the last 15 years.

The Cowboys have enjoyed a lot of success when they have played in Super Bowls — but they haven't played in one since 1996.

It has been pretty dry around here ever since — except for the Stars' Stanley Cup a dozen years ago.

There were a couple of false alarms. The Mavericks lost the NBA title to Miami five years ago, and last fall the Texas Rangers went to their first–ever World Series — but lost to San Francisco.

But Dallas sports fans have been patient — even when the Super Bowl came to town and the Cowboys didn't come close to playing in it — and their patience has been rewarded with an NBA title.

Now, to a football fan, that's almost like a consolation prize — but there are many basketball fans in this area and they gathered all over the city — but especially, I suppose, the American Airline Center, where the Mavericks play their home games — to watch the game and then celebrate the outcome.

Team owner Mark Cuban says he will pay for the traditional championship celebration parade. The details for that haven't been announced yet, but I imagine I will watch the parade from the same spot I watched the NBA Finals.

And count the days that are left until football season.

A Must-Win for Mavs?

I was having an e–mail conversation with a friend of mine shortly before the Dallas–Miami game on Sunday.

I asked my friend if he thought Dallas would win the game. He wasn't sure, but he did say he believed the winner of the game would go on to win the series — and, hence, the NBA title.

I agreed with him — but, I will admit, it was a pretty safe bet. The teams split the first two games, which meant the series had become a best–of–five. The winner would only need to win two of the remaining four games while the loser would need to win three.

While I don't know the exact numbers, I think the finalists have split the first two games about 40% of the time since the NBA introduced its current schedule in the finals — the first two games played at one site, followed by three games at the other site, followed by the last two games at the original site — about 25 years ago.

By the time the game tipped off on Sunday night, I had heard from numerous sports writers — in both interviews and columns — that the winner of the third game had always gone on to win the whole thing.

That must mean that history is on the side of the Miami Heat, who held on for a two–point win.

Sean Deveney of The Sporting News sums it up for many when he says Miami is "clearly ... the much better team."

I would admit that Miami has been the better team in the first three games. But much better? Clearly better? I don't think so.

As I have conceded on many occasions, I am hardly an expert on the NBA. I am, at best, a casual observer. I haven't followed the NBA closely since I was a kid. I usually don't get interested in the NBA until it reaches this point in the playoffs.

Nevertheless, there are some things that I know — and that I will continue to believe until I am proven wrong.

One is that, although home court/field is an advantage in the early going, by the time you reach this stage of the playoffs, home means little, if anything, beyond being able to sleep in one's own bed.

For a true champion in any sport, a game is played within the confines of the playing surface, and whatever is happening outside those boundaries is separate from what is taking place within them.

Oh, sure, I suppose some of the younger, inexperienced players may be affected by opposing fans' efforts to distract them, but not championship–caliber veterans.

I think my point has been proven in the first three games of this series. The home team won the first game; the visiting team has won the last two.

And the last two games were decided by two points each. One was a great comeback (although, when compared to the epic comeback against Oklahoma City in the previous round, Dallas' come–from–behind victory in Game 2 wasn't as impressive — at least not numerically).

That doesn't necessarily suggest that anyone has dominated things yet.

Actually, it reminds me more of this year's Triple Crown in horse racing. The winner of the Kentucky Derby had to come from way behind to win that race, then almost did the same thing but came up just short in the Preakness a couple of weeks ago. Now, the horses will run in Saturday's Belmont Stakes, which is the longest of the three races.

The winner of the Derby has proven to be the fastest horse at the end of the first two races. His speed and endurance could well pay off in Saturday's Belmont when his rivals start to fade.

After three games of the NBA Finals, you knew that someone was going to have two wins — at least. Regardless of what led up to them, the final margins suggest that the teams were competitive at the end — and that suggests that the rest of the games in this series, however many that turns out to be, will be entertaining.

That makes me believe that tonight's game is not a must–win for the Mavericks — although a loss will certainly make things much more difficult for them.

It is an important game, though. If I were you, I'd watch.

Will Third Time Be the Charm for Big D?

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It's been a long time since a professional sports championship came to Dallas.

Ironically, that championship was won in hockey.

This is a city that, for decades, was accustomed to being a legitimate factor in championship conversations. More than that, it is part of a state that has long been accustomed to being a factor in such discussions.

Usually, it has been in the context of football — but it has been nearly 15 years since the Cowboys played in a Super Bowl.

For that matter, Dallas as a city has been away from the national sports radar through most of the still nascent 21st century.

Sports supremacy has been tantalizingly close in recent months, though.

The Texas Rangers have been playing baseball around here for 40 years, and they brought a World Series to these parts for the first time last October. They didn't win it, but they brought it here, and they gave local fans a taste of what it is like to host the Fall Classic.

Most sports fans around here might not have noticed, however, if the Dallas Cowboys had lived up to their preseason hype. When the season began, local fans knew that the Super Bowl would be played in the Cowboys' new stadium, and many believed the Cowboys were practically a lock to become the first team from the host city to actually play in a Super Bowl.

But the Cowboys stumbled out of the gate and never came close to competing for a playoff spot. The Green Bay Packers won the Super Bowl as the NFC's representative.

Now, it is the Mavericks' turn — that's Dallas' NBA franchise — to try to do what the others could not.

They dispatched the Oklahoma City Thunder, four games to one, in the Western Conference finals, and they await the winner of the Chicago–Miami series.

No one knows how long the Mavericks will have to wait on that one.

Miami can finish off Chicago with a single win. Chicago needs three straight wins to turn back Miami.

If the series goes seven games, Dallas will have a week to prepare for its next foe. If the Miami–Chicago series is completed tonight or Saturday, the championship series will start on Monday.

Folks around here don't seem to care when the dance begins. All that matters is that the dance can't be held without them.

And my guess is that a line is going to start forming for tickets soon, if it hasn't already. They go on sale Saturday morning. The latest weather forecast calls for daily highs in the 90s, but I have no doubt that people will be camping out for the next couple of nights.

There is clearly a sense in this city that destiny is beckoning.

But the thing is, people around here always feel that way when the local team is playing for a title. They felt that way when the Stars won the Stanley Cup in 1999 — even though most of the Stars' "fans" that year probably were more appropriately bandwagon jumpers.

They felt that way when the Rangers faced the San Francisco Giants in the World Series last year. (Much was made locally of the "long–suffering fans" who had waited 40 years for a world championship, but I recall little being said of the long–suffering Giants fans, who had been waiting almost 20 years longer for a world title.)

That probably isn't uniquely Texan. The fans of every team in every sport believe they are entitled to a championship — until, at some point, their teams are eliminated and they must face the truth that most fans must accept at some point.

The fans around here aren't ready to accept that truth. Nor is it necessary for them to do so.

Oh, sure, there are some naysayers. Some say the Mavericks won't be able to handle the Miami Heat, their most likely foe.

And that may be true.

But that doesn't really matter right now.

The Promised Land?

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Here in Dallas, Texas, there is a sense of inevitability settling in after last night's astonishing come–from–behind triumph over Oklahoma City in the NBA Western Conference finals.

The Christian Science Monitor called it "one of the most jaw–dropping comebacks in NBA history."

That may be true. I've seen some pretty amazing comebacks in my life, but nothing to compare with what happened about 200 miles north of here last night.

I'm not an NBA fan, but I will admit that I have been watching more lately. However, I had given the game up for lost. I left my TV on and went about some other things in my apartment. I could monitor the game, but, having conceded defeat, I didn't feel I needed to sit and watch it.

I changed my mind a few minutes later.

Down by 15 points with about five minutes to play, the Mavericks doggedly chipped away at the upstarts from OKC, forced the game into overtime and, as Eddie Sefko writes in the Dallas Morning News, never trailed in overtime (after never leading during regulation).

When the Mavericks returned to Dallas early this morning, a couple hundred people were on hand to meet them.

Today the giddiness and disbelief from last night seems to be morphing into supreme confidence, even cockiness. Sure, I heard one man say, there have been teams that have come back from a 3–1 deficit but not many.

Not many, but some. To pull that one off, it seems to me that a team has to be loaded with playoff veterans with the discipline and the concentration to remain focused on the task at hand.

I have my doubts that Oklahoma City can do that.

But as my friend who used to cover horse racing during our mutual Arkansas Gazette days like to say, there is no such thing as a sure thing.

It could happen. It isn't likely, but it could happen.

However, I will assume that the Mavericks — who would have to lose at home not once but twice for the Thunder to leapfrog them into the NBA Finals — will face either Miami or Chicago for the NBA title.

That would mean that the Dallas area will have hosted

• the World Series


• the Super Bowl and


• the NBA Finals

within a single calendar year.

As far as I know, that would be a first.

Mind you, I'm not talking about cities that had teams that participated in three major professional sports championships within a calendar year.

(I think New York came close to that when the Jets played in the Super Bowl in January 1969, the Mets played in the World Series that autumn and the Knicks played in the NBA Finals in the spring of 1970. Technically, that exceeded a calendar year, but New York did win all three.)

The site of the Super Bowl is decided years ahead of time. It has been played annually for 45 years, and, while it is not the NFL's explicit policy to prohibit cities without NFL teams from hosting Super Bowls, no city without an NFL franchise has ever hosted one.

And no host city's team has ever played in one.

For awhile, folks around here figured the Cowboys would be the team to change that. It didn't happen. Instead, two of the Cowboys' old postseason rivals met in the Super Bowl in February.

But it was played here in Dallas. In October, the Texas Rangers brought the World Series here for the first time — and now it appears the NBA Finals will be played here, too.

I think that's a first.

When the Bucks Didn't Stop

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With the exception of the folks who live there, most people don't seem to be paying much attention to the 40th anniversary of Milwaukee's only NBA championship.

But it's worth thinking about as the NBA careens toward what would have been thought to be an unlikely championship series when the season began — no matter what the pairing may eventually turn out to be.

Later today, the Dallas Mavericks, who have had all week to savor a four–game sweep of the two–time defending champion Lakers in the second round, will learn whether they will face Oklahoma City (formerly the Seattle SuperSonics) or Memphis (originally a 1995 expansion team) in the Western finals.

Those three franchises have precisely one title between them — and, if Memphis defeats Oklahoma City today, it will be certain that the representative of the Lakers' conference will be seeking its first league championship.

The same can't be said of the championship series in the East that is slated to begin tonight after the Oklahoma City–Memphis game concludes. Both of the teams in that series — Miami and Chicago — have won NBA titles. Miami beat Dallas five years ago, and, as for Chicago, well, surely you remember the Bulls' dominance of the 1990s.

(I don't really have to recite the story of Michael Jordan for you, do I?)

I'm not a devoted follower of the NBA. In fact, I seldom get interested in professional basketball until things get to this stage. So I could be all wrong about this. But my guess is that the winner of the East is going to be the favorite heading into the championship series, no matter who wins the West.

To mildly misquote a phrase from Bob Dylan, though, I would not feel so overwhelmed. There might be some good karma for the winner of the West — especially if it turns out to be Dallas.

Forty years ago this spring, the Milwaukee Bucks (who had only been in existence for three years) won their first and only NBA title.

Many things were different then. The NBA, like all professional sports leagues, was much smaller; so, too, was its playoff field.

Kareem Abdul–Jabbar was on that Milwaukee team. But, although practically no one ever mentions it anymore, that wasn't his name at the time.

In the 1970–1971 season, he had not yet converted to Islam — and he was still known by the name he played under at UCLA — Lew Alcindor. He was definitely a dominant player, just as he had been in college, and he won Rookie of the Year the season before when he led the Bucks to a 29–win turnaround (the most impressive in league history to that point) and nearly took them to the NBA Finals.

The Bucks won it all the following season, but I always felt they did so not because of Alcindor but because they acquired Oscar Robertson — and took some of the pressure off Alcindor.

I was in elementary school that spring. There were few hockey or basketball teams in my part of the country in those days. Baseball (particularly the St. Louis Cardinals) usually grabbed everyone's attention until the football teams began their conditioning drills for the fall.

That spring, though, all eyes in my little town were on the NBA and Lew Alcindor. My memory of that time is that he drew most of the attention — and that was as it should be, I suppose. He did win the MVP award for the championship series.

But what so many people forget is how Robertson — long before the three–point shot — piled up more than 20 points in the first half of Game 4 and staked Milwaukee to a lead over Baltimore that it never relinquished.

Afterward, the Milwaukee coach said Robertson had been "unbelievable" on that day, and he had been.

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No one could have matched Willis Reed's gutsy performance in Game 7 of the previous year's final series — but Robertson came close, clearly finishing off the Bullets that day.

The game, as I remember, was all but over by halftime. The second half was a mere formality.

Remember what I said about that karma stuff and the Dallas Mavericks? Well, I was thinking about the fact that, 40 years ago, the Bucks had to beat the Lakers to get to the NBA Finals.

Dallas has already topped the '71 Bucks with its victory over L.A. The Mavericks swept the Lakers in four games; the Bucks went 4–1 against the Lakers (but they did have to face Wilt Chamberlain).

In those days, the Lakers hadn't won an NBA title since long before they left Minneapolis in the early 1960s. They were considered competitive but hardly formidable, always a bridesmaid but never a bride.

They certainly didn't carry the aura of a two–time defending champion.

Perhaps their victory over the Lakers will propel the Mavs to their first NBA title — just as it did for the Bucks 40 years ago.