Riley finds joy in title
MIAMI — Bruce Springsteen was blaring through the speakers. "Come on up for the rising," the Boss crooned. And in the middle of a packed Dallas hotel ballroom early Wednesday morning, Pat Riley, sore hip and all, danced with joy.
That was the song played in the Miami Heat's home arena just before tip-off of every NBA finals game, a song Riley referenced often around his team, part of the never-ending motivational ploys that, at long last, carried the Heat to basketball's pinnacle — a world title.
And it's a song that'll surely be played next fall, when Riley will see a banner rising to the rafters in Miami.
"I don't know how anyone else is doing," Riley said early Wednesday, still sopping from his first championship champagne bath since leading the Los Angeles Lakers to a title in 1988. "But we are doing fine."
A season filled with turmoil ended in celebration — and, for Riley, vindication.
As he showed on the dance floor, Riley still has all the right moves. His sweeping roster changes last summer worked. His decision to return as coach when Stan Van Gundy resigned worked. And it all came together Tuesday, when the Heat beat the Dallas Mavericks 95-92 to win Game 6 of the NBA finals — Riley's seventh championship, fifth as a head coach.
"I'd give up six of them for this one. I just would have," Riley said Tuesday night. "I would have traded them all in for this one. It's not disrespectful to any of them that I won. But after 18 years, and chasing, you know, you keep chasing it, you keep chasing it, you get tired. So this gives me a sense of absolute freedom."
The criticism started last summer, when Riley let two starters from a 59-win team go elsewhere and brought in four players who were supposed to be locker-room cancers, the type of player who couldn't mesh with the likes of Dwyane Wade and Shaquille O'Neal.
How did that foursome do in the finals?
• Gary Payton hit shots late in Games 3 and 5 that ultimately won games for Miami.
• Antoine Walker had a double-double in Tuesday's title-clincher and had a big playoff run.
• Jason Williams ran the offense exactly as Riley envisioned.
• James Posey took charges and hit 3-pointers with regularity, including a dagger to help seal Game 6.
"He put this thing together," Posey said, "and we all knew what could be accomplished."
"You can't talk about this all year long," Riley said, holding up one of the team's "15 Strong" motto cards Tuesday night, "and when you get to some adversity, buckle. We went through it. To get the prize, you have to go through the fire, and you've got to go through it over and over. ... At the very end what I had and what this team had was a team of established, strong, and settled players. That's what wins for you."
