Nba Finals

NEW YORK -- Exhibition games with free admission. Open scrimmages. Five hundred seats set aside per game at the bargain price of $10 each. Curtailing the movement of players.In a week when the NBA was nearly ruined, those were some of the promises offered for a new, fan-friendly league after the NBA's board of governor's yesterday ratified a six-year collective bargaining agreement with the players association.NBA commissioner David Stern and players union director Billy Hunter -- adversaries during the lockout that lasted more than six months -- sat side-by-side in peace on a day that earlier this week looked as if it would mark the cancellation of the season.

IN THE MID-1980s, I fell hopelessly, fanatically and totally in love with professional basketball. There were three reasons for my unbridled passion for the game. Each of those reasons is no longer playing: Magic Johnson, Larry Bird and Michael Jordan.Johnson first retired in late 1991 when he tested HIV-positive. Bird left a year or so later because of back problems. Jordan announced this week that he was hanging up his Nikes.The National Basketball Association's golden era -- which began in 1980, when Magic and Bird entered the league -- ended this week with Jordan's retirement.

INGLEWOOD, Calif. -- The Utah Jazz spent the entire 1997-98 season as the best team in the Western Conference. Yesterday, they simply made it official.Riding the shoulders of a 32-point, 14-rebound effort from All-Star forward Karl Malone and a bench that outplayed Los Angeles every minute, the Jazz earned their second consecutive trip to the NBA Finals with a 96-92 win over the Lakers for a four-game sweep in the Western Conference finals.This was only the fifth playoff sweep of the Lakers.

CHICAGO -- There was a drained look on Karl Malone's face during a media session earlier this week as he answered one question after another about winning the NBA's Most Valuable Player award. Not once did he snap, but with each response the Utah Jazz forward became more and more irritated."It's no longer Karl Malone anymore," Malone said. "It's MVP Karl Malone. Expectation levels are at an all-time high right now. But that's a positive for me."Malone's remarks came before the Jazz was embarrassed by the Chicago Bulls, 97-85, on Wednesday in a game that left Utah trailing the best-of-seven series 2-0.Only twice before has an NBA team come back from an 0-2 deficit to win an NBA Finals series.

SEATTLE -- If you're in search of a Seattle SuperSonics player who still has a pulse through three disappointing games of the NBA Finals, Gary Payton is your guy. On the court he's a trash-talking chatterbox, confident against anyone. Why, he even had the audacity to go word for word with Michael Jordan during the first two games.So, Gary, tell us how the Sonics are going to become the first team in the history of the league to come back from an 0-3 deficit and win the NBA Finals."They've been [to the Finals]

HOUSTON -- They hang as reminders in the bedroom of Robert Horry's home. They are framed jerseys from the Detroit Pistons, the team the Houston Rockets shipped Horry to last season after becoming dissatisfied with his lack of aggressive play."

ORLAND0, Fla. -- When the 53-minute classic finally had ended, having provided more thrills than any Hollywood thriller could serve up, Houston Rockets coach Rudy Tomjanovich tried his best to sum up what he had just witnessed."

HOUSTON -- Why not the Houston Rockets? Why not again?Why? Because you don't win with a sixth-place team that struggled all season, you don't win without a true power forward, and you don't win with a bunch of CBA and European league castoffs.But the Houston Rockets again are NBA champions, ending an improbable run to the title with a 113-101 win over the Orlando Magic last night that completed a four-game sweep and a playoff stretch in which they knocked off the top four teams in the NBA."

NEW YORK -- They've lost two straight games here against the New York Knicks, have seen their backcourt outplayed throughout the NBA Finals, and have crumbled in crunch time against a relentless defense.Yet, to a man, the Houston Rockets want you to believe they did all they wanted to do in three games in New York, despite the fact they face elimination on their home court tonight."We accomplished our goal, which was to regain home-court advantage," said center Hakeem Olajuwon, whose Rockets won Game 3 in New York to take a 2-1 lead in the series.

May 11, 1979: Announced he will make himself available for the NBA draft.May 16, 1979: The Los Angeles Lakers, who acquired the right to draft No. 1 when Gail Goodrich signed as a free agent with New Orleans before the 1976-77 season, announced they reached a contractual agreement with Johnson.June 25, 1979: The Lakers selected Johnson with the first pick in the 1979 NBA draft.Feb. 4, 1980: Became the first rookie to start an NBA All-Star Game since Elvin Hayes in 1969. Scored 12 points in a 144-136 West loss.

ORLANDO, Fla. - -Kobe Bryant had that one hole in his impressive resume, that one unanswered question everyone seemingly held against him. Sure, he had three NBA championship rings. But could he win one without Shaquille O'Neal? We finally got our answer Sunday night. Bryant coolly and efficiently led his Lakers past the not-ready-for-prime-time Orlando Magic, 99-86, in Game 5 of the NBA Finals, giving Los Angeles its 15th NBA title. Phil Jackson won his record-breaking 10th NBA title as a coach, surpassing the nine Boston Celtics legend Red Auerbach won from 1950 to 1966.

ORLANDO, Fla. - -Kobe Bryant had that one hole in his impressive resume, that one unanswered question everyone seemingly held against him. Sure, he had three NBA championship rings. But could he win one without Shaquille O'Neal? We finally got our answer Sunday night. Bryant coolly and efficiently led his Lakers past the Orlando Magic, 99-86, in Game 5 of the NBA Finals, giving Los Angeles its 15th NBA title while winning Finals Most Valuable Player honors. Phil Jackson won his record-breaking 10th NBA title as a coach, surpassing the nine Boston Celtics legend Red Auerbach won from 1950 to 1966.

No, you won't see Kobe Bryant and the Los Angeles Lakers against LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers in the NBA Finals showdown many fans had been predicting - and clamoring for - since before the start of the season. Instead, Bryant and his teammates will clash with star center Dwight Howard and the Orlando Magic, who eliminated the Cavs in the Eastern Conference semifinals. It's experience versus precociousness. Bryant, 30, is a 13-year pro with three championship rings. In his fifth NBA season, Howard, 23, is making his first trip to the Finals.

Lakers@Celtics 9 p.m. [Chs. 2, 7] The Lakers won Sunday, but the Celtics are ahead in the series, 3-2. Although the Lakers had big leads in the past two games, the Celtics have shown they are capable of erasing those leads and actually pulled out Game 4 - which is the difference in this series so far.

When the NBA Finals shift back to Los Angeles, we should hold a big ceremony at midcourt before the game so Jack Nicholson can hand over one of his Oscars to Paul Pierce. Nicholson will probably be fine with it. He has three, after all (One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Terms of Endearment, As Good As It Gets). And a thespian like Nicholson can certainly recognize what a beautiful acting job Pierce did in Game 1 of the NBA Finals when he looked as if he needed to have his leg amputated at one moment.

SAN ANTONIO - Some final thoughts about an NBA Finals that America should have paid more attention to: Somehow it had all been forgotten by the end of Game 7, but Tim Duncan badly sprained both ankles during the course of the season, and they never had a chance to really heal. It doesn't exactly excuse him for those shaky performances leading up to the finale against the Pistons, but it earns him extra praise for the way he carried the Spurs to the championship, from beginning to end. For Duncan, that's three rings and three Finals Most Valuable Player awards in eight seasons, one year ahead of Michael Jordan's pace.

SAN ANTONIO - Where would these NBA Finals be without Big Shot Bob? Correction: Big Shot Rob. "You can make it Rob, R-O-B, but B-O-B, that's not me," Robert Horry clarified yesterday in the wee hours of the morning inside The Palace of Auburn Hills in Michigan. Fan of alliteration or not, Horry has earned the right to be called whatever he wants, regardless of what everyone else wants to call him. For example, Savior. That nickname fits. These Finals, horrendous to endure for four games, are now special because of him. The San Antonio Spurs have life and a leg up on a third championship because of him. His legacy is even more secure than it already had been, and even for those who recoil at the runaway egos in the sport, he offers a nice rebuttal, a breath of fresh air and a hope for the triumph of the best the game has to offer.

AUBURN HILLS, Mich. - You wanted an NBA conspiracy? You got one. C'mon, you think the arrival of the cavalry - the return of the smash hit, As the Lakers Turn - in the middle of the most depressing Finals in memory was a coincidence? Unfortunately, it was a coincidence. In fact, NBA officials around The Palace of Auburn Hills appeared none too pleased that Phil Jackson's official return to coach Kobe Bryant and the Lakers - their "reconciliation," as Jackson put it - was staged mere hours before the resumption of its showcase event, the Finals that the Spurs lead 2-1 after last night.

MIAMI - They will wonder about the "could-have-beens." They will ponder the "what-ifs." In the end, a season of incredible accomplishment and unprecedented joy will be haunted by heartache for the Miami Heat. Last night, Miami's season of dreams came to a premature end, the combination of Shaquille O'Neal and Dwyane Wade not enough to catapult the Heat past the Detroit Pistons and into the NBA Finals. In the final two minutes of the game, the Pistons outscored the Heat 12-4, turning a one-point deficit into an 88-82 victory, claiming the Eastern Conference finals, four games to three, and earning a return trip to the Finals, where they will defend their 2004 title against the San Antonio Spurs.

Late NBA game: Last night's Game 5 between the Los Angeles Lakers and Detroit Pistons in Detroit ended too late to be included in this edition. A complete report can be found in later editions or on the Internet at www.baltimoresun.com. DETROIT - The run to greatness began in 1988, on the floor of a locker room shower at the Forum in Inglewood, Calif., where two weeping Bad Boys passed a champagne bottle back and forth. The Lakers had just knocked off the Pistons in the seventh game of the NBA Finals.