On the eve of the NBA Playoffs, a prediction seems to be in order. As you can probably tell from the title of this post, there's little doubt in my mind that the Dallas Mavericks will push the memory of last year's epic collapse out of their minds by capturing their first NBA title. By doing so, they will join the last two Super Bowl winners as teams that followed a season marked by a crushing disappointment in the playoffs with a championship.
Last year's NBA finals saw the complete public unveiling of a new superstar (Dwayne Wade, who would close out the year being selected as Sportsman of the Year by Sports Illustrated), and a great story featuring a scrappy, out-manned underdog with a crusty old coach (OK, so Pat Riley isn't that old, but he ain't what he used to be, either) coming from off the deck to score an unexpected, somewhat miraculous victory. But the real story of last year's Final was the aforementioned epic collapse of the Mavericks, who went about as far as a team can possibly go in terms of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.
Much like the 1989 Oakland Athletics, who were reeling after having been upset the previous year by a team clearly inferior to them in virtually every respect, the Mavericks have bounced back this year with a vengeance, never looking back from an improbable 0-4 start to make a serious run at the Holy Grail of 70 regular season wins. They are battle-tested, they learned a critical lesson last year, and they will defeat the Detroit Pistons in the NBA Championship.
Even though, it is probably fair to say, the four best teams in the NBA are all in the Western Conference.
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