So here we are staring at two Game 6s in the NBA playoffs, with the Oklahoma City Thunder and Boston Celtics looking to close things out after emotionally-wrenching, threshold-crossing, series-tiebreaking road wins.
We’ll have our NBA Finals pairing by midnight Thursday, right?
The entirety of NBA history would beg to differ.
It’s been said so many times, it’s now in cliché territory, but there really isn’t anything harder in this sport and all the others that winning that clinching game.
We live in a world of premature coronation (yet another way social media has enriched our lives), and never has that been more risky than right now.
â€" Eastern Conference finals: Garnett shines for Celts | Golden opportunity for Boston | LeBron defined by Game 5 performances | Recap: Celtics 94, Heat 90 | Celtics-Heat news archive
â€" Western Conference finals: Thunder roll players making big noise | Preview: Spurs at Thunder, 9 p.m. ET | OKC a win away from Finals | Multiple titles away Kevin Durant | Spurs-Thunder news archive
So, Oklahoma City, beware. Don’t clear your schedules for next Tuesday and Thursday just yet.
Boston? A better reason to book a flight. At least these Celtics have been down this road before. It’s uncharted territory for the Thunder. The next step seems so simple and so inevitable. They wouldn’t be the first ones to hear that, or think that, or believe that.
“Nope, they sure wouldn’t,†say the 1994 Indiana Pacers.
“No way,†add the 2002 Sacramento Kings.
“Uh-uh,†grumble the Cleveland Cavaliers from just a few years ago.
To be fair, the Cavs weren’t victims of the sure-thing closeout game, just the sure-thing next-great-era. Think counting the number of rings LeBron James hasn’t won since taking his talents to South Beach is a scream? Remember what set the stage for all of that: the three seasons following his Game 5 breakthrough against Detroit (addressed here recently) and ensuing trip to the Finals in ’07.
Don't count your chickens before they hatch: Russell Westbrook and Kendrick Perkins can celebrate now, but should remember to keep things in perspective. (AP Photo)
“They’re here!†everyone proclaimed.
They weren’t. By July of 2010, neither was LeBron.
More apropos to the Thunder dilemmaâ€"almost an exact matchâ€"is the Reggie Miller fourth-quarter choke-sign-to-Spike-Lee game at Madison Square Garden in 1994. Ironically, Miller was sitting courtside with the TNT crew Monday night as the Thunder shocked the Spurs in San Antonio in a pivotal fifth game. Not coincidentally, probably, Miller never uttered a word on-air about the trap being set.
The forgotten piece of history from that classic Reggie game, of course, is that the Pacers paraded back into their building for Game 6 against a Knicks team described by all as dead men walkingâ€"only to lose that game, lose Game 7 back in New York at the scene of Reggie’s outburst, and not surface in the Finals until six years later, then never again.
Finishing it off, closing it out, was easier said than done.
Chris Webber, Vlade Divac and the Kings didn’t have home court on their side in Game 6 against the Lakers in 2002. That also happens to be the one game the whole planet is sure was stolen by the refs, and the numbers back that up, and ... let’s move on.
The Kings did have Game 7 on their home floor, in front of what’s still the craziest crowd I’ll ever see in my lifetime (yes, Oklahoma City, you’ve got work to do to match that cowbell-clanging bunch)â€"and lost in overtime.
Sacramento never got that one win. A decade later, it may not keep its team. Finish that series, and the history of the NBA in that city is different from that moment on.
Not too much pressure, though, Thunder.
Also, OKC faithful, try not to think about the other almost-but-never-weres in the last few decades. The late-1980s Hawks of Dominique Wilkins, Kevin Willis and a guard named Doc Rivers, who seemed just as poised as that era’s Pistons to surpass the Celtics.
... the Mavericks teams of that same era that kept finding ways to lose to Magic’s Lakers. ... the 1990s Knicks teams that had Michael Jordan’s Bulls on the ropes so many times. (paging Charles Smith) ... the Clyde Drexler-Buck Williams Trail Blazers.
Heck, these Miami Heat are one loss away from joining that esteemed group. In their defense, though, they’re not facing some novices. The Celtics climbed through that window four years ago.
The Spurs, facing elimination, have the Celtics’ pedigree, and more. They also have history on their side.
The Thunder better have learned that history. They haven’t won anything ... until they’ve actually won it.
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