NBA finals: Leading Cleveland Cavaliers to historic win, LeBron James does justice to his legacy

The Cleveland Cavaliers have achieved the impossible.

In the closest and most competitive game of the entire NBA Finals, the Cleveland Cavaliers beat the Golden State Warriors 93-89 at an extremely loud and boisterous arena, away from home, in the deciding and most important game of the entire season.

It was one of the most amazing comebacks in all of sports and LeBron James was responsible for it. For a player whose main criticism has been his lack of late-game killer instinct and clutchness at the biggest and most important games, this win is probably his most important Championship. The Cleveland Cavaliers came back to win from 3-1 down, and in the process did what no other team has ever done in the history of the NBA.

At the start of these Finals, the data and analysis website FiveThirtyEight.com gave the Golden State Warriors a 75 percent chance of winning the 2015-16 NBA Championships, and a even higher percentage after going up 3-1. With the series tied at three games a piece, ESPN gave the opponents of the Cleveland Cavaliers a 65 percent chance of winning. Those were amazing but realistic odds, even though LeBron James has just scored 41 Points in back-to-back games, and Kyrie Irving was complimenting him with great performances. The Warriors had not lost three games in a row ever since their current Head Coach Steve Kerr took over from Mark Jackson in 2014, and since no team had ever come back from a 3-1 deficit, the Cavaliers were always going to be the underdogs.

But something happened at these NBA Finals. Steph Curry and Klay Thompson did not play as well as LeBron James and Kyrie Irving. One could even argue that the Cavaliers just wanted it more, and the Warriors became complacent when the job had not yet been done. Klay Thompson, after Game 2, stated that his team could beat the Showtime Lakers of Kareem Abdul Jabar Raheem and Magic Johnson as they were known. Talk that a team – even though it had won more games than any other team in the history of the Regular Season and even though it had just achieved the improbable when it came back from 3-1 down at the Western Conference finals – should have never engaged in. Their only job was to try and make sure they beat the Cavaliers four times.

The suspension of Draymond Green, just before the start of Game 5 was also a factor. He’d been instrumental in guarding LeBron James, and it disrupted the flow of the Cavaliers’ offence. And in a must-win Game 5 at their home court, James and Irving combined for a monumental 82 points, the most two-player combination in NBA Finals History. Going into Game 7, this Finals was always going to create history one way or the other. If Steph Curry and the Golden State Warriors had managed to win, it would have gone down as they greatest season in history after beating the 95-96 Bulls’ record of 72 wins in the Regular Season.

But the other and more improbable alternative happened, and with it completed the most amazing turnaround and stories in all of sports. LeBron James went back home and won a title for his city. He’d left the Cleveland Cavaliers for the Miami Heat after a most hyped, drama-induced, absurd event, whereby on a televised ESPN Special that felt more Professional Wrestling than Basketball, he announced that he “was taking his talents to South Beach.” He was mocked and ridiculed for it for years.

In Miami, he managed to win his first ring along with Dwayne Wade and Chris Bosh, and another one after having been so ineffective against the Dallas Mavericks in his first Finals with the Heat. A second Finals loss in four years, this time to the San Antonio Spurs, was instrumental in his going back to the Cleveland Cavaliers.

A second consecutive loss to the Warriors and their record-breaking back court shooting wouldn’t have done justice to the career and legacy of a man who’s been the world’s most gifted basketball player for the past decade.

And LeBron James ensured that a fifth Finals loss would not be. He produced a scintillating performances and was correctly chosen as the Most Valuable Player of the Finals in a unanimous vote. He averaged 29.7 Points Per Game and about 11.3 Rebounds and 8.9 Assists. Steph Curry averaged only 22 Points after having a regular season of 30.1 Points Per Game. It was a performance for the ages, and one that will be cherished for a very long time.