See details of the NBA Finals, Denver Nuggets vs Miami Heat – 05/31/2023 – Sport

There were still a few minutes left for the end of the match, last Monday (29), when Pat Riley left his seat at TD Garden. Triumphal, on the way to his 19th NBA final, he smiled in front of the Boston Celtics fans with the consecrated victory of the Miami Heat in the seventh and decisive game of the Eastern Conference.

The gym is not the same one where Riley, as a coach, led the most delicious achievement of the Los Angeles Lakers, champions at Boston Garden in 1985. Many of the courts are not the same anymore. The game of basketball itself has changed a lot. What hasn’t changed is the constant presence of the “Godfather” in the decision.

The nickname is justified for the one who went from player to assistant coach, from assistant to commander, from coach to manager, always with resounding success. Today Miami President Patrick James Riley, 78, is now part of an impressive 24.7% of the finals in the history of the North American Basketball League.

The Denver Nuggets are in their first.

The paths that led the two teams to the final confrontation were very different. Owner of the best campaign in the Western Conference, the Denver Nuggets established clear dominance over their opponents. With an exceptional performance by center and playmaker Nikola Jokic, 28, he dispatched Minnesota Timberwolves, Phoenix Suns and Los Angeles Lakers without major problems.

Miami, seventh in the East in the standings, had to play the “play-in” tournament, which defines the last two spots for each conference in the “playoffs”. Lost duel with the Atlanta Hawks. In the next game, the last chance, he was behind the Chicago Bulls with just over three minutes left.

But he won and, with the eighth place, he went to face the favored Milwaukee Bucks, of Giannis Antetokounmpo, best campaign of the league. When Jimmy Butler hit one of his clinching shots in the Heat’s 4-1 series win, the cameras quickly panned to Riley, who was smiling, superior, not making any blunt gestures.

This has been the case for over a decade. The vain Pat –Michael Douglas’s inspiration in the composition of the character Gordon Gekko, in the film “Wall Street – Power and Greed”, from 1987– still likes to show off, seductive look, hair combed back, but he doesn’t talk as much as he did. His spokesperson is pupil Erik Spoelstra, 52, the great coach at the helm of a finalist on which few were betting.

When Riley decided to step off the bench in 2008, it was Spoelstra he bet on. LeBron James, in his passage through “South Beach”, even asked that Erik be fired and Pat return to the edge of the court. Spoelstra stayed and led LeBron to his first two NBA titles.

Stability is part of the “Heat Culture”, a term that was adopted to designate the atmosphere established in the club. Champion as a Miami coach in 2006, Riley guided Shaquille O’Neal and Dwyane Wade to the trophy. Then, pen in hand, he paired LeBron and Chris Bosh with Wade for two more cups.

Now their star player is Jimmy Butler, 33, a winger who rotated erratically around the league until he found himself under the Godfather’s wings. Three of the team’s key players failed to make the NBA via “draft,” the rookie recruiting system that welcomes 60 youngsters each year.

But then again, Pat Riley is in the finals, something he’s done for six decades — seven if you include his time as a Kentucky college shooting guard.

“Players come and go, great players. When LeBron left [para retornar ao Cleveland Cavaliers], it was a shock for us. I won’t even get into right or wrong, but it was a shock. Either way, our culture has remained. You have good years, bad years, but you don’t change the way you do things,” he said in 2017.

Recent interviews are basically non-existent. Notorious for conflicts with managers when he was a mouthy coach, Pat has a much more restrained pupil in Spoelstra. The coach previously questioned by LeBron James is now recognized as one of the greatest in the history of the sport. And he knows where he came from.

So defeating the Boston Celtics in the East Finals became almost a moral duty. Riley had epic battles with the Green team in his Lakers days. Defeated in the 1984 decision, he got his revenge with the triumphs of 1985 and 1987.

“Pat has a certain feeling for Boston. So I work to get everyone to have a certain feeling for Boston. It’s part of my job,” smiled Spoelstra.

Celtics on the canvas, Riley emerged from his seat at TD Garden triumphant, suit lined up. He didn’t have to give any interviews to let everyone know how he felt about the victory of a group full of modest players over his hated rival.

“Most of the time, he’s backstage, out of the way of the players,” Dwyane Wade told The New York Times in 2012. “He’s become the boss he always wanted, the boss he thinks he wants. you should be: stay behind the scenes, do your job”, noted coach Jeff Van Gundy, another of his pupils, now a commentator for ESPN North America.

From the corner, millimetrically accurate hairstyle, the Godfather will observe another series in which the Miami Heat is not the favorite. And it will mark his presence, for the almost unbelievable 19th time, in an NBA Finals.

Denver Nuggets vs Miami Heat

Jun 1 (Thurs), 9:30 pm – Nuggets x Heat
Jun 4 (Sun), 9pm – Nuggets vs Heat
7.jun (Wed), 9:30 pm – Heat x Nuggets
9.jun (Fri), 21h30 – Heat x Nuggets
12.jun (mon), 21h30 – Nuggets x Heat*
Jun 15 (Thurs), 9:30 pm – Heat x Nuggets*
18.jun (Sun), 21h – Nuggets x Heat*

*if necessary

Streaming: Band, ESPN, Star+, and NBA League Pass