Crushing loss fueled Miami's run

MIAMI — When the Miami Heat's players and coach think about their fellow first-time NBA finalists, the Dallas Mavericks, they think about speed, versatility and Dirk Nowitzki.

But the horrifying images of Feb. 9 are foremost in their mind. That night in Dallas, the Mavericks ran the Heat out of the gym with a 36-point rout on national television.

The Heat players were so disgusted with themselves that guard Gary Payton stood up in a team meeting after the game and said to coach Pat Riley on behalf of his teammates, "O.K., Pat, what's it going to take to get better?"

And Riley said, "It's time to follow the leader."

Now Riley thinks of that ignominious night and smiles. "From that day on, we got better," Riley said Sunday after Heat practiced at American Airlines Arena.

"That's what that game did for us. It humiliated us, embarrassed enough on national television where we started coming together, doing the things we were talking about doing, not worrying about who was shooting, who was playing, what the rotation was. A lot of things changed."

Shocked by their own ineptitude in the 112-76 defeat in Dallas, the Heat players stormed back to beat Detroit in the next game — an omen, as it turned out, for the Eastern Conference finals, where Miami eliminated the Pistons in six games. The Heat won 10 straight after the loss in Dallas and lost only 10 games the rest of the season and just five in the postseason.

"This team woke up," Dwyane Wade said.

The Mavericks beat the Heat twice this season — including a 13-point victory in November, when Shaquille O'Neal was sidelined with a sprained ankle — but both teams are decidedly different.

They are more cohesive and better prepared for each other after dispatching in earlier rounds the last two champions of the league — San Antonio and Detroit.

Miami and Dallas, teams established in the 1980s, represent the new order of the NBA. Despite their common arena sponsor, the teams are a set of mismatches. Their offensive styles clash like plaid against polka dots.

Nowitzki and O'Neal represent an extreme contrast in 7-footers, one skilled and fleet, the other burly and bruising.

Dallas coach Avery Johnson will savor his NBA finals debut, while Riley reminisces about his last eight trips and wonders if this will be his last. The Mavericks will be brimming with youth and hope for many return trips. The Heat will be leaning hard on its 30-somethings, trying to maximize the present.

"You come into this season, nobody — nobody — had Miami and Dallas in the finals," Johnson said. "If you did, you won a lot of money."

Riley was certainly not betting on it Feb. 9.

"I wasn't thinking about the world championship that night," he said. "I was thinking about getting back on defense more than anything else."

The Mavericks' offense is fast, furious and confounding. They can win with halfcourt precision and defense (as they did to beat Phoenix) or by running (as they did in beating San Antonio). When they routed Miami in the regular season, they did so by forcing a faster tempo and neutralizing O'Neal.

"We didn't play against Shaq the first time," Mavericks guard Jerry Stackhouse said. "The second time, we ran the heck out of him. I think that's a team that we want to try force the tempo against a little bit."

O'Neal just smiled at the suggestion. "I don't know why people don't think I can run," he said Sunday. "When you're running and banging against me, that's to my advantage."

How can the Heat slow the pace? "You got to get back and you got to keep shooting that ball at a high percentage," O'Neal said. "Nothing we haven't seen before, Chicago ran, Jersey ran. They have a lot of matchup problems, but we have a lot of matchup problems, too."

Miami will start out with power forward Udonis Haslem defending Nowitzki, but Riley said it would be a group effort, mixing coverages on Nowitzki, the only player in these playoffs to score 50 points.

"He's one of the best players in the world," O'Neal said of Nowitzki. "He's where the big man's game will be in four, five years. It will be based on whether them guys can play like Dirk or not. I'm going to let my children watch his game."