2011 NBA Finals

2011 NBA Finals was the championship series of the 2010–11 season of the National Basketball Association (NBA) and the conclusion of the season's playoffs. The Western Conference champion Dallas Mavericks defeated the Eastern Conference champion Miami Heat, 4–2, to win their first NBA title. Dallas became the latest NBA team from Texas to win its first title, after the Houston Rockets won back-to-back titles in 1994 and 1995, and the San Antonio Spurs won in 1999, 2003, 2005, and 2007; all three Texas NBA teams have now won at least one NBA Championship.

The series was held from May 31 to June 12, 2011. Under a 2–3–2 rotation, the Miami Heat had the home court advantage; the Heat hosted Games 1, 2, and 6, and was set to host a deciding Game 7, had one been necessary. German player Dirk Nowitzki was named Finals most valuable player. Nowitzki was the second European to win the award, after Tony Parker (2007) and the first German.

Going into the series, the Heat were heavy favorites with their newly acquired stars of LeBron James and Chris Bosh along with returning star Dwyane Wade. The series was a rematch of the 2006 finals, which was won by the Heat in 6 games after Dallas blew an early two-game lead.

The Dallas Mavericks became the first team in NBA history since the institution of the 2–3–2 format to enter Game 3 tied 1–1, lose Game 3 and still win the Finals. The previous 11 times this has occurred, the Game 3 winner went on to win the series.

Background

Both the Mavericks and Heat made their second appearance in the NBA Finals, the first for both teams being the 2006 NBA Finals. This Finals marked a rematch of the 2006 Finals, won by Miami in six games, after the Mavericks were up 2–0.

It was also the first time since 2006 that neither the Los Angeles Lakers nor the San Antonio Spurs represented the Western Conference in the Finals and only the second time since 1998, and also the thirteenth consecutive NBA Finals to feature a Western Conference Champion from either the states of California or Texas.

The Mavericks' appearance also meant that three of North America's four major professional sports championships were played in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex in a span of 8 months, with the 2010 World Series and Super Bowl XLV both occurring in nearby Arlington.

The Heat had home-court advantage by virtue of a better regular-season record than the Mavericks. This was only the second time (2008) that the Eastern Conference had home court advantage during the Finals since the end of the Michael Jordan era in 1998. It also marks the first time since 1995 that the Eastern Conference team lost in the Finals despite having home court advantage.

The 2011 series marked the first time a Finals match (Game 1) was played in the month of May since 1986.

Among the players from both teams, only Dirk Nowitzki and Jason Terry of Dallas, and Dwyane Wade and Udonis Haslem of Miami, appeared in the 2006 series with the same team. Heat center Erick Dampier played for the Mavericks in 2006. Aside from Dampier, Caron Butler, Juwan Howard and Shawn Marion are the only other players who have played for both the Mavericks and Heat. Eddie House, Žydrūnas Ilgauskas, LeBron James and Jason Kidd have appeared in the Finals with different teams, with House (as a member of Boston's 2008 championship team), Wade and Haslem winning a championship ring. Mavericks head coach Rick Carlisle won a championship as a reserve for Boston's 1986 championship team making him only the eleventh person in NBA history to win a Finals as both a player and a coach.