The Mavericks face the Celtics in this year’s NBA Finals. Jason Kidd’s team finished fifth in the regular season in the West, which they just won, which means they have had a better season in the West. playoffs. Is a feat that few have achieved before, so those who can say they have done something like this are a minority before.
The brightest mirror in which to look is that of the Houston Rockets: in 1981 they placed 6th in the regular league and managed to reach the Finals against the Celtics, against whom they lost 4-2, and they repeated the experience in 1995 but on that occasion with a happy ending, since they placed 6th in the regular league and reached to the Finals against Magic whom they beat 4-0.
Another case could be that of Miami Heat. During the coronavirus bubble (2020) they placed 5th in the East and, although they reached the Finals, they did not manage to win them against the Lakers with that 4-2 in favor of the Angelenos. Similar to what happened to the 2011 Heat with the wonder trio Wade-LeBron James-Bosh, who were defeated by the same Dallas Mavericks, 3rd in the regular league of that 2010/11 season, with a result of 4-2 .
The Mavericks in 2022, already with Luka Doncic as leader of the project, reached the finals against the Warriors. Those from Dallas finished 4th in the regular league. They passed a first round against the Utah Jazz (4-2). In the semifinals they met the Suns (4-3) and in the conference finals those from San Francisco were not at all merciful to the Mavs: they won 4-1. With Doncic averaging playoffs 31.7 points, Brunson 21.6 and Dinwiddie 14.2. From what they saw most recently, in 2023, they finished in 11th position in the regular league, which is why they failed to qualify for the playoffs it’s from the season.
The last known precedents being out of the top-3 have been the Rockets, finishing 5th in 1996 and falling in the Western semifinals against the Supersonics, and the Celtics, the other finalist this year, who finished 4th in the regular league and won the final round of the playoffs in 1969 against the Lakers.
The Mavericks can go down in history based on doing better than they have done in the regular league, since in the playoffs They have been able to defeat those who – in the West – were in 1st position (Thunder), in 3rd position (Timberwolves) and in 4th position (Clippers). And just as it would be a surprise if they won the Finals, because they face the team with the most wins in the entire NBA this season (Boston Celtics), Dallas already knows what it’s like to be on the other side of the currency. It was seen when they fell in the first round against the 8th, one of the greatest blows of the century in that sense, in the 2007 Playoffs when, being the first in the Western Conference, they saw how the We Believe Warriors woke them up from their sleep.
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