NBA Finals: Knockout!

DALLAS – They were a collection of something old and something new. An aging coach of legend and many championships from long ago. A veteran center of unique power, who casts the shadow of a redwood. A young gun developing into a superstar, one fantastic finish at a time.

Pat Riley. Shaquille O’Neal. Dwyane Wade. A holy basketball triumvirate joined clearly with an NBA title in mind. The Miami Heat had many promises to keep.

Tuesday night, amid seething hostility, they kept them.

The last step was a 95-92 victory over the Dallas Mavericks, delivered by Wade’s 36 points, by Riley’s confident leadership. Plus the spare parts Riley had collected as the final pieces, from Antoine Walker’s 11 rebounds to Udonis Haslem’s 17 points, to Alonzo Mourning’s five blocked shots to James Posey’s late crucial baskets.

All were needed to take the NBA Finals 4-2, and give Miami its first pro basketball championship, a moment not assured until Jason Terry’s 3-point shot rattled in and out at the end for Dallas.

“We wanted it,” said series MVP Wade. “And we took it.”

“From a coaching standpoint, my greatest concern and fear was I wasn’t going to have enough for these guys,” Riley said of the team that gave him his fifth title, 18 years after his fourth with the Los Angeles Lakers.

“After 18 years of chasing … you get tired. So this gives me a sense of absolute freedom from having to chase it, desperately chase it.”

For the Heat, it was the perfect closing argument: a victory on the road, in a series where home court had meant everything. A celebration in a inflamed arena, where they had not won in four years, against a shocked opponent that only a week before had been 6 minutes from going up 3-0, and then crumbled with four losses.

“We never thought,” Dallas coach Avery Johnson said, “we’d get beat four games in a row.”

“You can’t talk about this all year and when you get to some adversity, buckle,” said Riley, who returned to the bench from the front office in December. “To get to the prize, you have to go through the fire.”

But then, Riley had vowed years ago this night was coming. So had O’Neal.

“I imagine in my mind the symbolic championship parade right down Biscayne Boulevard,” Riley said the day in 1995 he became the Miami coach.

“Remember this: I’m going to bring a championship to Miami,” O’Neal, a three-time winner with the Lakers, said the day in 2004 he became the Heat center.

Bold guarantees came true on a hot summer’s night in Texas. But it would never have happened without Wade.

“I’ve been a big dreamer all my life,” said the man who grew up near Chicago watching Michael Jordan win titles. “The comparison (to Jordan) is flattering, but at the same time I always stay away from them because there will never be another Jordan.”

He averaged 34.7 points in the finals. He turned around the series in Game 3, when the Heat were 13 points behind and 6 minutes from being dumped in a near-hopeless hole. He saved Game 5.

Wade didn’t score in the first 10 minutes of Game 6.

Then he was ready to add another chapter to a rapidly growing epic, with 10 rebounds, five assists and four steals to go with his scoring.

He hit four free throws in the last minute to keep Miami in front, though he missed two with 10 seconds left. But there would be no way out for the Mavericks.

“I don’t want to say I put this team on my back,” Wade said. “We did it together.”

Miami needed all Wade could offer, on a night O’Neal scored only nine points and picked up his fifth foul with 10 minutes left. A night when the Heat were often pushed outside by a Dallas zone, and hit only 2- for 18 in 3-pointers.

“He just took it to another level,” Riley said. “He’s making a legacy in his third year.

“Dwyane’s probably one of the most respected young players this game has had in a long time.”

“We tried a lot of different things,” Johnson said. “But he had a lot of desire.”

Dirk Nowitzki had 29 points for Dallas, but not a fourth quarter field goal.

With the chance to go ahead in the final minute, down 91-90, a pick-and-roll pass from Nowitzki to Erick Dampier went awry – the last fatal turnover for the Mavericks.