Two days from now, we will have a historic NBA Finals, with the Miami Heat becoming the second-ever eight seed to advance to the season’s last round, while the Denver Nuggets are making their first ever NBA Finals appearance in franchise history, and will look to become the first team since the 2018-19 Toronto Raptors to win the championship in their first ever appearance.
Of course, both teams took entirely different roads to get to this point. Let’s start with the Heat, as they needed to win the last Eastern Conference play-in game against the Chicago Bulls for the right to face the league-best Milwaukee Bucks, the latter of whom they upset in five games. This was then followed by them both winning a grueling six-game series against the New York Knicks, and avenging their Eastern Conference Finals loss of last season against the Boston Celtics via winning Game 7 on their (the Celtics’) homecourt this season. And as for the Nuggets, well they finished as the best team in the Western Conference, followed by going a combined 8-0 at home in the postseason against the Minnesota Timberwolves, Phoenix Suns and Los Angeles Lakers, with the second series and third series both ending on the road and in six and four games, respectively. Now the question is can they go 10-0, 11-0 or 12-0 at home to give their city a championship one season after the Colorado Avalanche did?
Well, given what Jimmy Butler is capable of in any given game, I think the Nuggets’ home playoff winning streak will come to an end and I don’t see the Heat losing a home game in this series. The Heat will close it out in six games and Jimmy Butler’s John Wick-like offense will be on full display, thus he will get the Finals MVP.
Yeah, the last team to get into the Eastern Conference playoff bracket will be the last one standing on June 15, 2023. Tune in either June 16, 2023 or June 19, 2023 to find out how I did with my prediction.