MIAMI — Over Biscayne Bay, the skies are gray. And on Miami Beach, sunbathers are sparse. But still, in humid South Florida, the heat is on.
And inside of the American Airlines Arena, the Miami Heat are on.
The clock, that is.
After turning in an impressive 66-16 regular season and winning an astonishing 27 games in a row, the Heat have been front-running since the All-Star Break. All of it, including their gutsy triumph over the bruising Indiana Pacers, will be for naught if the Heat do not accomplish the rare feat of winning their second consecutive NBA championship.
But old man Tim Duncan, his defiance of father time, and the rest of his entourage have different ideas.
It is time for the 2013 NBA Finals to commence. At the end of the day, only one team will hold the Larry O’Brien trophy. Here are the five factors that will determine which team does. Our staff picks are at the bottom.
The “Can You Handle This Moment?” Factor
“It’s just a matter of containing the other guys. You don’t want LeBron to get his 30 and then Ray Allen to get his 18 and Wade to get his 25 and Chris Bosh to get 20… Hopefully, you can pick one or the other.” – Gary Neal
In 2007, James’ Cleveland Cavaliers were not able to put up much of a fight against Tony Parker and his surgeon-like slicing of their perimeter defense. But in 2005, in a hard-fought seven-game series, it was Robert Horry’s improbable 21-point bench barrage that helped the Spurs steal a one-point victory in Game 5—on the road. Behind Horry, the Spurs took a 3-2 series lead over the Detroit Pistons and eventually won the series, and the title.
In Game 2 of the 2008 Finals, we saw Leon Powe score 21 points in 15 minutes against the Los Angeles Lakers, and the Boston Celtics ended up winning the title in six games.
And of course, in the 2012 Finals, we saw an interesting dichotomy. James Harden failed to show up—he shot just 38 percent in the series—while Mike Miller erupted for 23 points in the series-clinching Game 5 win.
Last year, the Finals stage and the critical final minutes of games seemed to suffocate the Thunder. Now, one year later, the Spurs should rightfully have similar concerns about their supporting cast. Kawhi Leonard, Danny Green, Matt Bonner, and even Boris Diaw have never been on this stage. Meanwhile, the Heat have only two players who have never played in an NBA Finals—Chris Andersen and Jarvis Varnado.
Someway, somehow, if the Spurs are to win this series, either Leonard or Green will have to prove themselves to be a big-time player and do what Horry, Powe and Miller did for their respective teams. Be a role player who makes a difference—be one who helps to steal a game.
The “Do You Love the Basketball?” Factor
“They like to hedge, they like to trap… The trapping and scrambling, the best way to beat that is to move the ball. Get rid of it as soon as you see an open man… The more you move it, the more difficult it is to trap.” – Danny Green
The 2007 NBA Finals MVP, Tony Parker, has the unenviable task of being his team’s best player and taking care of the basketball against the Heat. The Heat want to run, they want to sprint and they want to score 100 points. Turnovers enable them, but so do long “bail out” shots that result from broken plays and poor offensive execution.
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Very often, we have seen the Heat’s perimeter defenders challenge long 3-point shots and immediately sprint off for transition opportunities. The Spurs simply cannot allow that to happen. And they probably will not.
If there is one thing we know about the Spurs team, is that they do not panic and they do not allow their opponent to dictate what they do offensively. Without a floor general of the caliber of Parker, the Heat were able to blitz and trap the Pacers and crowd passing lanes. On the interior, they were able to make passes difficult for Roy Hibbert and David West, but neither of those two are better passers than Duncan and Boris Diaw.
When Frank Vogel coached against the Heat in the 2012 playoffs, he told his team that the Heat’s major weakness is playing against a disciplined offensive team with good passing. He was correct then, and although his team could not get the job done one year after he initially said that, he is correct now.
For the Spurs, the most difficult thing for them will be getting the same dribble penetration that enables their perimeter ball movement. If the Heat can succeed in keeping Parker out of the paint and not allowing others like Gary Neal to pump fake and step into 17-footers, maybe—just maybe—they can force the Spurs into some broken possessions and desperate heaves. Or, at least, disrupt their superb offensive chemistry.
But how much the Spurs love—and take care of—the basketball will go a long way to determine who emerges victorious.
Erik Spoelstra vs. Gregg Popovich
“I haven’t ever looked at it as an individual coaching challenge ever. That would be distracting. I’m focused, and our staff is preparing our team for this opportunity the best that we can.” – Erik Spoelstra
Count on the ever-politically correct Spoelstra to not make anything personal. But matching wits with Gregg Popovich—rightfully considered one of the best coaches ever—will be an amazing challenge.
Because of the talent he has been given, Spoelstra’s performance as a coach has been supremely undervalued and underrated. Last season, when the Heat refused to bail the Oklahoma City Thunder out by taking long 3-pointers, that was coaching.
This season, the 27-game win streak? That was coaching. And so was the outlasting of the Indiana Pacers. Spoelstra made a key decision in that series by reducing Shane Battier’s minutes and altering his rotation. And the Heat’s blitz and trap defense and brilliant counters to the Pacers’ high-low triangle sets in Game 7 were no coincidence.