The Miami Heat stars were excellent on Thursday night on the way to LeBron James winning his first NBA championship, but there shouldn’t have been as many people as there were who honestly thought James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh wouldn’t be able to step up when the game was on the line. There obviously were many people continuing the “not-clutch” narrative, but most fans of the game figured that the stars would be spectacular -- for both Miami and the Oklahoma City Thunder -- in this year’s NBA Finals.
It wasn’t the stars, then, but rather the role players who were expected to be key in the seven-game series -- and the Thunder entered the series with a considerable (perceived) advantage in that department when looking at the two team’s tale of the tape.
Instead, however, it was the Heat’s secondary stars that did more than anyone could expect as Miami picked up its first championship since the Big Three Era began, winning Game 5 121-106.
Shane Battier, Thabo Sefolosha, Mario Chalmers and Nick Collison all had big games in the Finals while stepping in to the spotlight, but it was Mike Miller who surprised those in the stands on Thursday night. Miller had basically been written off by almost everyone after being ineffective for the majority of his Miami stint -- he was averaging a measly 4.4 points per game up until Game 5 -- but he became a key player for the new world champions in the series-clincher.
The South Dakota native has dealt with a multitude of injuries as of late, but came through in the clutch on Thursday night with 23 points after knocking down seven of his eight three-point attempts off the bench. On a team full of players searching for redemption, it was great to see Miller show he can contribute when called upon after looking as though he was headed toward an early retirement not long ago.
Miller wasn’t the only Heat role player that found success this series, though, as the earlier-mentioned duo of Chalmers and Battier were overtly instrumental in helping the Heat to earlier victories in games that likely would have gone the other way if they didn’t do what they did.
For those that somehow weren’t paying attention until Thursday night, it’d be very difficult to discount Battier’s shooting -- he made 15 of his 26 3-point attempts in the Finals after shooting worse than 34 percent from beyond the arc during the regular season -- and Chalmers’ showing shan’t be overlooked with a great showing in Game 4 (25 points) after scoring a grand total of five in Games 2 and 3. Chalmers and Battier obviously weren’t bad on Thursday night either, of course, as Battier hit another three 3-pointers to go with stellar defense while Chalmers had 10 points and seven assists himself.
In a game so often said to be dominated by stars, that was again the case in this year’s NBA Finals ... but they weren’t the only players that played great amazing minutes on the big stage. The superstars in this series (LeBron, D-Wade, Chris Bosh, Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook) deserve as much credit as they’re going to be given over the next few weeks, but all great players need good role players around them -- and the lesser-known members of Miami showed during this series that they can’t be forgotten.