NBA FINALS 2013 Game 4

REPLAY NBA FINALS 2013: Game 4

The 2013 NBA Finals was the championship series of the 2012–13 NBA season and the conclusion of the season's playoffs. The Eastern Conference champion Miami Heat defeated the Western Conference champion San Antonio Spurs to win their second straight title. The Finals began with Game 1 on June 6, and ended with Game 7 on June 20.

Miami became the 6th team to win consecutive NBA Championships joining the Boston Celtics (1959–1966, 1968–1969), the Los Angeles Lakers (1949–1950, 1952–1954, 1987–1988, 2000–2002, 2009–2010), the Detroit Pistons (1989–1990), the Chicago Bulls (1991–1993, 1996–1998), and the Houston Rockets (1994–1995) in doing so. This series marked the fifth time the Spurs have made the NBA Finals since 1999, second-most for any franchise in that span behind the Los Angeles Lakers. The Spurs had won all of their previous four finals appearances, putting them only behind the six-time champion Chicago Bulls for most titles without ever losing a Finals, making this series the first Finals loss in Spurs history. This series was also the first time San Antonio had played in the NBA Finals without home court advantage, as Miami had home-court advantage based on their league-best regular season record. It was the Heat's third consecutive NBA Finals appearance, the first Eastern Conference team to achieve that since the Chicago Bulls (1996–1998).

Four former NBA Finals MVPs played in the series (the Spurs' Tim Duncan and Tony Parker, and the Heat's Dwyane Wade and LeBron James), the most since 1987. The 2013 Finals also set a record for most international players on either Finals roster. Tim Duncan became the fourth player in NBA history to make a Finals appearance in three different decades.

LeBron James and Tim Duncan have previously faced off in the 2007 NBA Finals, when James was with the Cleveland Cavaliers, which saw the Spurs sweep the Cavaliers in four games, giving San Antonio their fourth NBA title. After the deciding game, Duncan sought out James in the locker room to praise him for a great series and told James that the league would be his someday.

In 2010, Spurs president of basketball and head coach Gregg Popovich made a congratulatory phone call to Heat president Pat Riley for signing LeBron James and Chris Bosh to play with Dwyane Wade.

This was the San Antonio Spurs' fifth appearance in the NBA Finals, attempting to win their fifth NBA championship in team history. The Spurs finished the regular season with 58 wins, finishing in first place in the Southwest Division and the second overall regular season record among Western Conference teams. They recorded only two losses in the first three rounds of the playoffs: they swept the Los Angeles Lakers in the first round in four games, eliminated the Golden State Warriors in six games in the second round, then swept the Memphis Grizzlies in the Western Conference Finals in four games.

This was the Miami Heat's fourth appearance in the NBA Finals and the third appearance in three years, attempting to win their third NBA championship. The Heat finished with the best regular season record, recording a league leading 66 wins, and first place in the Southeast Division. They swept the Milwaukee Bucks in the first round of the playoffs in four games before eliminating the Chicago Bulls in five games in the second round, winning four straight games in the series. In the Eastern Conference Finals, the Heat defeated the Indiana Pacers in seven games.  From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia