Heat cools off Spurs in epic Game 7 to win 2013 NBA title

CROWN HIM KING AGAIN! Source: espn.go.com by David Santiago/El Nuevo Herald/MCT

The Miami Heat are the 2013 NBA champions. And the Spurs made them earn every last bit of that second straight title.

In a game fitting of what we’ve come to expect from these two teams in this series, LeBron James put on a jump-shooting display that resulted in his scoring 37 points, and being named the Finals MVP in leading the Heat to the championship in a dramatic 95-88 Game 7 win over the Spurs.

“It was odd, all year he had been the best perimeter jump shooter in the league, even though he’s an attacker and got to the rim, to the free‑throw line,” Erik Spoelstra said of LeBron’s outside shooting. “By the numbers he was phenomenal from 15 to 22 feet, and even from three. But their game plan was to really keep him out of the paint at all costs, and that meant giving him wide‑open looks. That was the case, and it probably messed with us a little bit. It takes you a little bit out of your normal rhythm. But eventually he was able to figure it out.”

Still King James

LeBron James and the Miami Heat remain atop the NBA, and not even a proud push from the San Antonio Spurs could knock them down.

James led the Heat to their second straight NBA title, scoring 37 points and grabbing 12 rebounds in a 95-88 victory Thursday night in a tense Game 7 of the NBA Finals that lived up to its billing.

Winning the title they needed to validate the best season in franchise history — and perhaps the three-superstar system they used to build it — the Heat won the second straight thriller in the NBA's first championship series to go the distance since 2010.

James continued his unparalled run through the basketball world, with two titles and an Olympic gold medal in the last 12 months.

He made five 3-pointers, defended Tony Parker when he had to, and did everything else that could ever be expected from the best player in the game.

Back-to-back Champions

The Heat became the NBA's first repeat champions since the Lakers in 2009-10, and the first team to beat the Spurs in the NBA Finals.

Players and coaches hugged each other after the game, the respect between the franchises that was obvious when the series started becoming even more apparent after two straight classics.

Fans stood, clapped and danced across the final minutes, when every score was answered by another score, each stop followed by a better stop. The Heat pushed their lead to six points a few times midway through the fourth but the Spurs would never be deterred.

The Spurs, so close to a fifth title just two nights earlier, couldn't find a way to grab it in this one, perhaps the last shot Tim Duncan, Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili will ever get together.

They were trying to become the first road team to win a Game 7 on the road since Washington beat Seattle in 1978, but those old guys ran out of gas just before the finish.

Tight Opening

 

Tony Parker of the San Antonio Spurs attempts a layup against the Heat defense. Source: NBA.com by Noah Graham/NBAE/Getty Images

James opened the game hitting just one of his first five shots, but finished it 12-of-23 from the field. Only three of his makes came in the paint, while four came in the range Spoelstra mentioned, and the last five were good from three-point distance.

The game opened with both teams a little tight, and the play was uneven and sloppy for a bit, perhaps due to the magnitude of the contest. The first quarter featured just 34 total points and seven combined turnovers, while neither team was able to shoot better than 37 percent from the field over the first 12 minutes.

Miami trailed 15-10 early, before Shane Battier hit three three-pointers to ignite an 11-1 run that seemed to get his team going. Battier finished with 18 points on 6-of-8 shooting from three-point distance, and this from a player that didn’t play due to a coach’s decision in his team’s last Game 7 against the Indiana Pacers.

“I believe in the basketball gods, and I felt that they owed me,” Battier said.

Resilient Dwayne Wade

 

Dwayne Wade (#3) of the Miami Heat drives past Manu Ginobili of the San Antonio Spurs. Source: NBA.com by Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images

The Heat got 23 points and 10 rebounds from Dwyane Wade, who has been up and down this series due to dealing with a deep bone bruise in his knee. He was especially active in the first half with 14 and 6, and was especially thrilled at the postgame podium afterward.

“All the giddiness is the champagne talking,” Wade said. “This is sweet.  This is the sweetest one by far because of everything we’ve been through, everything I’ve been through individually and to get here to this moment, to have that kind of performance, that kind of game, help lead my team, it’s special, man. So special.”

The third quarter was a back-and-forth affair, with the Spurs erasing Miami’s lead of five points and getting up by two before the period’s final possession. But Mario Chalmers banked home a three-pointer from about 30 feet out at the buzzer to send the Heat into the fourth with the lead, 12 minutes away from the title.

Twice in the fourth, jumpers from James pushed the Heat’s lead to six, and a three from Battier did the same with 3:19 to play. But Tim Duncan immediately answered with an and-1 play on the other end, and a three from Kawhi Leonard a couple of possessions later had the Spurs back within two with two minutes remaining.

It began to feel like the reverse of Game 6 was happening to the Heat, who came back so furiously and so quickly to prevent the Spurs from winning the championship 48 hours earlier. Mario Chalmers missed two free throws, and the Spurs had a couple of chances to tie or take the lead, the closest coming on a play where Duncan spun past Battier in the lane and missed a close one, before missing the chance at the put-back, as well.

Proud Spurs Fall

"To be at this point with this team in this situation, where people every year continue to count us out, is a great accomplishment," said Duncan, his voice quivering in a rare show of emotion for the intensely private star. "To be in a game 7 or be in a game 6 and up one with two chances to win an NBA championship, that's tough to swallow."

Duncan had 24, 12 rebounds and four steals and Ginobili scored 18 points with five assists. But Tony Parker struggled with just 10 points on 3-for-12 shooting and the Spurs were left lamenting the Game 6 collapse that cost them their fifth title under coach Gregg Popovich.

"Being so close and feeling that you are about to grab that trophy and then seeing it vanish is very hard," Ginobili said. "I think that if we would've lost both games like this, I would be a little more up. But it's a tough feeling."

The Spurs were in it the whole game, down 90-88 with two minutes to go after a 3-pointer by Kawhi Leonard. But Duncan missed two point blank chances to tie and had a turnover in the closing minutes, and James went out and grabbed the title that was there for the taking after the Spurs let it slip away.

“Missing a layup to tie the game,” Duncan said. “Probably for me, Game 7 is always going to haunt me.”

It was a heart-breaking way to end it for these Spurs, who were 21 seconds from title No. 5 when everything went wrong in Game 6. James hit a 3 and Ray Allen hit another with 5.2 seconds to go to tie it, and the Heat outlasted the Spurs in overtime to force a Game 7.

"It's such a fine line between celebrating and having a great summer with now feeling like crap and just so disappointed," Ginobili said.

Now, once again, they will face proclamations of their demise. Only this time, it may be harder to hold those off.

Duncan is 37, but coming off an All-NBA First Team season and a vintage performance in the finals. The 31-year-old Parker is nearing his apex after one of his finest seasons. But Ginobili will turn 36 next month and will be a free agent, perhaps marking the end of the three-person core that helped put the Alamo City on the NBA map, and keep it there for 10 years.

"I couldn't love our guys more," Popovich said. "What they accomplished this year was something nobody ever expected. They showed a lot of mental toughness and a lot of good play to get where they got. I couldn't be more proud of them."

They gave it their all, these Spurs. But in the end, James was just too much, and a prophecy came to be.

Beginning of the End

Then came the dagger from James, and fittingly, it was a midrange jumper that sealed it.

With the clock winding down to under 30 seconds remaining in the game, James dribbled at the top of the three-point arc. After a pseudo-screen from Chalmers briefly caused some defensive uncertainty between Tony Parker and Leonard, James found himself open from about 18 feet out on the right side. He collected himself, and just as he had done for the majority of the night, he buried the shot.

After it was all over, while flanked by both of the trophies he had just earned, James dissected his incredible shooting performance.

“I looked at all my regular season stats, all my playoff stats, and I was one of the best mid‑range shooters in the game,” he said. “I shot a career high from the three‑point line. I just told myself, don’t abandon what you’ve done all year. Don’t abandon now because they’re going under [on the screens]. Don’t force the paint. If it’s there, take it. If not, take the jumper. Just stay with everything you’ve worked on, the repetition, the practices, the off‑season training, no matter how big the stakes are, no matter what’s on the line, just go with it. And I was able to do that.”

The Best Basketball Player in the Planet

James is the best player in the game, and he played like it in Game 7. Really, he did that for the majority of the series, in a Finals that was played at one of the highest levels that we’ve ever seen by both teams.

The accomplishment was made that much more special given all that the Heat had to overcome to repeat as champions.

“Last year when I was sitting up here with my first championship, I said it was the toughest thing I had ever done,” James said. “This year I’ll tell last year he’s absolutely wrong. This was the toughest championship right here, between the two.  I mean, everything that we’ve been throughout this postseason, especially in these Finals.

“We were down — we were scratching for our lives in Game 6 down five with 28 seconds to go. To be able to win that game and force a Game 7 is a true testament of our, I guess, perseverance, and us being able to handle adversity throughout everything. It meant a lot for us to be able to do that and force a Game 7 and be able to close out at home.”

End for the Spurs?

For San Antonio, the questions begin now. Will Ginobili return? Can Duncan keep turning back the clock? And does the 64-year-old Popovich have another year left in him?

Parker chafed when asked if he thought this was the last run with this group.

"I can't believe you're asking that question," Parker snapped. "It's been five, six years you saying we're too old, so I'm not going to answer that."

Duncan said flatly that he will be back next season — "I have a contract that says I am" — and Ginobili said it was too soon to think about that.

"It's not the moment," Ginobili said. "I'm very disappointed, very upset. I really can't say anything."

The coach said, win or lose, he will take some time after the season to do some traveling and be with his family before he makes a decision. But he sure didn't sound like the kind of guy who was pondering riding off into the sunset.

"After a little while just getting up when you want to in the morning and really not having challenges gets a little boring," Popovich said before the game. "You can only grow so many tomatoes and read so many books. You want to get busy, get competitive again.

"When I stop feeling competitive around September, then I'll hang it up."

Vengeance Completed

Back in 2007, when the Spurs swept James and the Cleveland Cavaliers for the franchise's fourth title, Duncan found the young superstar for a quiet moment to tell him that the league would one day be his.

Now James has four MVPs, two Olympic golds and back-to-back titles on his resume. Duncan has been right so many times throughout his career. This time, it's at his expense.

James now has avenged his first finals loss. That helped send James on his way to South Florida, realizing it would take more help to win titles that could never come alone.

He said he would appreciate this one more because of how tough it was. The Heat overpowered Oklahoma City in five games last year, a team of 20-something kids who weren't ready to be champions yet.

This came against a respected group of Spurs whose trio has combined for more than 100 playoff victories together.

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