Miami Heat Won Championships Back to Back
The Miami Heat is an American professional basketball team based in Miami. The team was launched in 1988 and played in the 1988–89 season of the National Basketball Association The next season they moved from the Western Conference to the Atlantic Division of the Eastern Conference. After a mainly mediocre performance in the first few seasons, there were extensive team changes in 1995 and 1996 under head coach Pat Riley, including the recruitment of Isaac Austin and P.J. Brown. They reached the Eastern Conference Finals for the first time in 1996–97. They did not reach this level again until 2004–05, under new head coach Stan Van Gundy and with Dwyane Wade as a leading team member. At this time they transferred to the Southeast Division. The next year the team won the NBA Finals, defeating the Dallas Mavericks. The head coach position was next taken by Erik Spoelstra. Their next successful season was 2010–11, when they reached the NBA Finals again, losing to the Mavericks. Acquiring LeBron
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James as a player, they won the Finals in both 2012 and 2013, and won 27 successive games in February–March 2013. In 2013–14 they reached the Finals again but lost to San Antonio Spurs. James left the team in July 2014, and the 2014–15 season was less successful. In Florida, a state at the time without an NBA franchise, groups from Orlando, Tampa//St. Petersburg and Miami all vied to land franchises. The Miami Sports and Exhibition Authority eventually endorsed a group led by NBA Hall of Famer Billy Cunningham and former sports agent (and lifelong friend of Cunningham's) Lewis Schaffel, who received their financial backing from Carnival Cruise Lines founder Ted Arison, who would be majority owner. Day-to-day operations would be handled by minority shareholders Cunningham and Schaffel. In April 1987, the NBA expansion committee endorsed the bids of the cities of Charlotte and Minneapolis. However, the committee was split between awarding the third and final franchise to Miami or Orlando, causing representatives from both cities to toss barbs at the other. Finally, it was decided that the NBA would expand by 4 teams, with the Charlotte Hornets and Miami Heat debuting for the 1988–89 season and the Minnesota Timberwolves and Orlando Magic beginning for the 1989–90 season. The Heat came into the NBA for the 1988–89 season with an unproductive first year, with a roster full of young players and journeymen.
Among the players on the inaugural roster were first round picks Rony Seikaly and Kevin Edwards, fellow rookies Grant Long and Sylvester Gray as well as NBA vets Rory Sparrow, Jon Sundholm, Pat Cummings, Scott Hastings, Dwayne "Pearl" Washington and Billy Thompson. The team started out the season by losing its first 17 games, including a blowout 138–91, to Magic Johnson's Los Angeles Lakers, at the time an NBA record. It did not help that the Heat were placed in the Midwest Division of the Western Conference despite being located on the East Coast. This forced them on the longest road trips in the NBA; their nearest divisional opponent was the Houston Rockets, over 900 miles from Miami. The team ultimately finished with a league-worst 15–67 win-loss record (tied for worst season in franchise
history. For the 1991 NBA draft, the team selected Steve Smith from Michigan State, an agile guard, to usher in a new era of a mature Heat team. With the help of rookie Smith, Rony Seikaly, and a more experienced Glen Rice, the Heat finished in fourth place in the Atlantic Division with a 38–44 record even with a shocking defeat against the Cleveland Cavaliers 148–80 and made the playoffs for the first time in their history, becoming the first of the four late 80's expansion teams to do so. Playing the league-best Chicago Bulls, the Heat were swept in three games. Steve Smith made the NBA All-Rookie team and Glen Rice finished 10th in the NBA in scoring. While Salley's addition was first met with hope because of the role that he played on two championship Pistons squads, it became quickly apparent that Salley was a quality role player for a good team, but not a quality player for a mediocre team like Miami was at the time. Salley would eventually have his playing time diminish, ultimately resulting in his being taken by the Toronto Raptors in the 1995 expansion draft. As for the season itself, it started off poorly, with Smith missing time with a knee injury and Burton being lost for most of the year with a wrist injury. Upon Smith's return, Miami posted a winning record in February and March, but it was not enough to dig themselves out of the 13–27 hole they began in. They finished 36–46 and would not return to the playoffs.
The source that I used, “Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Biography” by Biography.com no authors are listed is a great source that gave me a lot of information that will help me with my reader response essay. I came across this website by entering my search question into Google. After looking through a dozen of articles “Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Biography” had the most detailed information of all the links. This article gave me a lot of information that will be correlating to my search question which is this: What major influences did Kareem Abdul-Jabbar have in his basketball career? The “Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Biography” article had three sections that broke
Our staff tells you who was snubbed as an NBA All-Star starter. Jonathan Ebrahimi () : For starters, I think we all agree that Westbrook was snubbed this year. He’s keeping a largely under-talented Thunder team in the thick of the playoff hunt and is putting up historically great numbers to do it. Out East, there are two players I feel have been overlooked. For starters, Isaiah Thomas has been having a wonderful season for Boston.
Steve Nash is considered one of the greatest point guards in the first decade of NBA, and he already became a national hero in Canada based on his tremendous achievement as a professional basketball player. However, according to his interview, Nash was considered a player without sufficient talent to be even a good college player in the United States. No college was willing to offer him a scholarship initially, because he was a Caucasian player from Canada. Caucasian players were widely considered as athletic inferior to African players, and Canada was also considered a country that has few talented basketball players. This is a typical stereotype about Caucasian basketball players in NBA, and usually
In Feburary the Timberwolves had a six and seven record. The Timberwolves also reached a
In the nineties the Chicago Bulls had an awe inspiring and credible team. The top two records from the Chicago Bulls in this era are still among the top ten recorded high records of all time. The Chicago Bulls acquired their best two series in the years of; 1992 and 1996. In 1992, the Chicago Bulls went 67-15, and in 1996 they had 72 wins allotting only ten loses (www.NBA.com). The highest record, of the time, in the top ten records was broken by the record of the Chicago Bulls in 1996. In 1996 the Chicago Bulls defense made 345 blocks, 745 steals, and caused 1,175 turnovers. The offense was responsible for 544 three point shots! While in 1992 the team had a low percentage of making their three point shots only making 138 out of 454 attempts. However they managed to make 3,505 two point shots out of an attempted 6,714. They also were ...
NBA star Mosses Malone practiced basketball with Hakeem at the gym in Houston. Patrick Ewing and the Georgetown University Hoyas met the University of Houston in the 1984 NCAA finals. Hakeem led the Cougars to two NCAA finials and was the number one pick in the 1984 NBA draft. Ralph Sampson was the center for the Houston Rockets until Hakeem joined the team. Bill Flinch was Olajuwon's first coach in the NBA.
The Miami Heart Franchise has been around for twenty-six years. In 1988, through an NBA expansion the team began begun with a disappointing start with a 15-67 record for their first season (Fleming, 2014). The progress was slow, however in 1992 made their first playoff appearance finishing fourth place. The Heat made their first trip to the NBA national championships finals in 2006 against the Dallas Mavericks. In this championship, the Heat accomplished a new feat. They rallied from a 0-3 deficit to win the finals.
...t was trying to stay alive against the San Antonio Spurs. Luckily, they pulled a NBA championship against the veterans which gave Miami Heat victory.
NBA stands for National Basketball Association, which has thirty organizations in all and all of them but one in the United States. The other organization that is not in the US is in Canada. The NBA was founded in June 6, 1946 in New York City. A lot of major ice hockey arena owners helped to create the NBA. The first official game ever was played on November 1, 1946 in Toronto, Ontario. The NBA has now been around for about sixty-eight years. Throughout all those years there has been three very dominate teams/organizations. There is the Los Angeles Lakers with 16 championships. There the Boston Celtics with 17 championships, and the Chicago Bulls with only six championships. All of these organizations have had plenty of great players, but the best player ever is considered to be
The eventual winner was Selinda King she acquired $1,000 dollars plus season tickets to the suns first inaugural season. In the expansion draft the Suns selected Dick Van Arsdale, which turned out to be a great pick because he ended up averaging 17.6 points a game for Phoenix. Other players selected by Phoenix were: Gail Goodrich, Neil Johnson, David Latin, Stan McKenzie, McCoy McLemore, Dick Snyder, and George Wilson.
They were one of the original eleven teams in the National Basketball Association (NBA). “In total they have seventeen Championships and twenty-one finals appearances” (Greatest
The Boston Celtics of the 60’s were like the Chicago Bulls of the 90’s or the San Antonio Spurs of the 2000’s. They had players that were game changing, like Michael Jordan or Tim Duncan. Their statistics in the 60’s were mind blowing. They had several winning seasons and many championship runs during this time. The Celtics were the most influential NBA team in the 60’s because they had game changing players, won several championships, and had record breaking statistics.
When the league was created, the game was only made up of seventeen teams, both from small and large cities(History.com Staff NBA is born). The first NBA finals was played in 1947, and the first All-Star game was in 1951(NBA.com NBA Top Moments). However, through the 1950s fan support was lacking. By 1954, the NBA was down to only eight teams(History.com Staff NBA is born). This same year a person by the name of Leo Ferris invented the twenty-four second shot clock. This helped speed up the pace of play, which allowed the game to become faster and more exciting. In the 1960s the NBA was beginning to grow, but a rival league known as the American Basketball Association of the ABA challenged the NBA. However, this didn’t last long, by 1976 the ABA and NBA merged into one league. Another milestone for the
Genghis Khan’s Creation of the World’s Largest Empire Throughout history, there have been many great and powerful empires that formed through intense battles and wars. These same empires have seen failure and destruction, collapsing as quickly as they were built. However, before their inevitable collapse, many saw triumphant victories that have influenced the world and shaped the society in which we live now. One such victory is that of Genghis Khan, founder of the largest contiguous empire in history (Gibson 93).
When the league was formed, the game was only made up of seventeen teams, both from small and large cities(History.com Staff NBA is born). The first NBA finals was played in 1947, and the first All-Star game was in 1951(NBA.com NBA Top Moments). However, through the 1950s fan support was lacking. By 1954, the NBA was down to only eight teams(History.com Staff NBA is born). This same year a person by the name of Leo Ferris invented the twenty-four second shot clock. This helped speed up the pace of play, which allowed the game to become faster and more exciting. In the 1960s the NBA was beginning to grow, but a rival league known as the American Basketball Association of the ABA challenged the NBA. However, this didn’t last long, by 1976 the ABA and NBA merged into one league. Another milestone for the