In a Historic Upset, Warriors Stun Mavs

Warriors 111, Mavericks 86

Baron Davis overcomes a strained hamstring and makes a variety of off-balance shots like this one on his way to 20 points. (Robert Galbraith - Reuters)

OAKLAND, May 3 -- Don Nelson may never see the $6.6 million he believes he is still owed by Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban. So the Golden State coach exacted another form of payment Thursday night when his No. 8 seed Warriors delivered a decisive elimination blow to the top-seeded Mavericks in front of a rabid home crowd at Oracle Arena.

It could well be that the 111-86 win is worth more to the 66-year old coach than any check.

Playing a quintessentially Nelson style of basketball -- up-tempo "small ball" perfectly suited to the talent of his roster -- and feeding off the energy created by a capacity crowd that showed up long before tip-off and made ear-splitting noise throughout the game, the Warriors made NBA history with a series-clinching victory.

Dallas posted a league-high 67 wins during the regular season and was considered a favorite to win the championship behind its MVP candidate, Dirk Nowitzki. But Nowitzki was rendered a non-factor and finished with eight points on 2-of-13 shooting Thursday night.

It is the first time in league history that a No. 8 seed beat a No. 1 seed in a best-of-seven series and the Warriors will await the winner of the series between the Houston Rockets and Utah Jazz. Game 7 of that series is Saturday night at Houston.

And just in case anyone thinks that the Warriors will duck out now after pulling off the biggest playoff upset the league has ever seen, guard Baron Davis issued a warning.

"This is definitely the beginning," said Davis, who shook off a sore right hamstring to score 20 points on 7-of-17 shooting. "We're going to learn a lot. We learned a lot in this series, with the technicals and the fines and everything that happened, but in the end, we kept our poise and played good basketball."

Davis energized a capacity crowd of 20,677 by scoring 13 points in the second quarter to give the Warriors a 50-48 lead at halftime. Forward Stephen Jackson sparked a 24-5 third-quarter run by making four straight three-pointers. Jackson, who was ejected at the end of Games 2 and 5, made 7-of-8 three-point attempts, took his turns defending Nowitzki and finished with a career-playoff high 33 points in 44 high-energy minutes.

Nowitzki, so dominant throughout the regular season, had a nightmare of a final game. He missed his first eight shots and never looked comfortable against the smaller, quicker defenders Nelson employed against him and finished with 8 points on 2-of-13 shooting. Apart from the closing minutes of Game 5 when he made two clutch three-pointers and came up with a key block, Nowitzki was a non-factor.

"He just struggled," Dallas Coach Avery Johnson said. "He struggled getting shots and he missed some open shots when he did get them."

Perhaps no coach in the league is as familiar with Nowitzki as Nelson, who was the Mavericks coach for eight seasons and helped the 7-foot German develop from an awkward teenager to one of the game's most unique talents before departing in March of 2005. Nelson, who selected Johnson as his replacement in Dallas, still claims that Cuban owes him $6.6 million in deferred compensation and is in the process of making an arbitration claim.

Nowitzki could go down as one of the most disrespected MVP candidates in league history. Because the Mavericks failed to finish after taking a 2-0 lead over the Miami Heat in last year's NBA Finals and because he struggled against the "small ball" tactics employed by the Warriors, critics will spend the off season questioning Nowitzki's heart and leadership skills.