Rose basketball highlights
Writer reviews NBA finals
TUES. | 10-20-20 | SPORTS
The NBA Finals took place from Sept. 30 to Oct. 13 2020 in Orlando, FL at the NBA Bubble, which was created to ensure the health of the players and coaches participating in the finals this year. The Miami Heat and the Los Angeles Lakers were the two teams playing in the finals this year, and played in a best of seven game series.
The first game of the finals was played Sept. 30 and the Lakers defeated the Heat 116 to 98. On Oct. 1, the Lakers won 124 to 114. On Oct. 4, the Heat beat the Lakers 115 to 104. On the 6th, the Lakers won 102 to 96. On the 9th, the Heat won 111-108. Lastly, on Oct. 11, the Lakers won 106-93. This concluded the finals as the seventh game of the series was not needed.
The Heat entered the finals as a fifth seed in the eastern conference, while the Lakers entered as a top seed in the western conference. The Heat have not played in the finals since 2014, when they had LeBron James playing for them. He most likely was a big part of the reason the Heat made it to the finals. James says that he is thankful for his four years on the Heat, as he learned a lot during his time and improved his skills.
Many people believed that the Lakers would win the finals because the Heat would have to beat LeBron James. He has played in eight consecutive finals and 10 in total. This year, James wanted to win the Lakers a championship, which they had not done in 10 years.
There were other predictions that have the Heat coming out on top, as the Lakers did not have their star defender Avery Bradley, who decided not to play due to personal concerns
Graphic by Emmy Ingalls
involving his family. This quite possibly served as an obstacle for the Lakers, but I was proven right when I said that James would be powerful enough to handle things. The Lakers worked around the fact that Bradley was out but the Heat definitely pushed the team and took advantage of the situation. The Heat may have been intimidated by James, but they did have a few veteran players such as Butler, Crowder and Iguodala who they put their trust in. Bam Adebyo, their star center, faced the Lakers’ Dwight Howard who is an eight-time all-star. I personally think these two were very entertaining to watch up against each other. With the end goal of defeating the Lakers, the Heat looked at statistics from the season and made some decisions on how they planned to stop the Lakers. Previously, the Heat played both the Bucks and the Celtics, defeating both teams fairly easily.
The New York Times’ prediction was that “There is also a more-than-solid chance that the Heat will play some zone defense against the Lakers, who have been one of the poorest three-point shooting teams in the playoffs, at 35.5 percent.”
I personally thought that the Lakers would win the finals because when Anthony Davis and Lebron James are put together, there is not much anyone can do as these two know how to dominate.I thought there was a chance of Jimmy Butler putting up a challenge, but that he would not have a good chance of success over both Davis and James.
In the end, the Lakers won the 2020 Finals 4-2. Lebron James was named the finals MVP, which only fits as Lebron was not only the best player between these two teams, but one of the best of all time.
