'Tough' Love

Video

Butler, Wizards Force Game 6

Members of the Washington Wizards discuss their 88-87 victory over Cleveland in Game 5 of the Eastern Conference quarterfinals.

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The shot with less than four seconds remaining was so clutch, easily the signature moment of Butler's career, on a night when he could not miss when it mattered. But it's the gamesmanship that followed, the moxie to saunter up to James before the game's final play, smiling and jawing at the same time.

"Let's make the series interesting," he said, as LeBron laughed.

"Let's take it back to D.C."

Shaken or not, LeBron missed a point-blank layup. The Wizards looked around, stunned that they had not heard a whistle or a deafening roar. After a few seconds of disbelief, they began jumping in each other's arms, in utter shock that they had beaten the Cavaliers to win their second game of a series they gave no prior inclination to extend past five games.

"I had to get him back for what he did to Gilbert a couple of years ago," Butler said, referring to James toying with Gilbert Arenas's mind moments before he missed two free throws that helped cost Washington the series in 2006. "Just had to."

Daniel Gibson bemoaned the loss, saying, "We let one slip away."

Now you now how Washington feels, Boobie.

Jordan always liked his players, but for most of the past four years he often lamented the lack of stone-cold competitors on his team, players with the guts and gumption to seize an elimination playoff game on the road against an NBA deity like James and the defending Eastern Conference champions. Hence, the nickname "Tough Juice" for Butler, the idea that something extra was coursing through his veins that Jordan wanted his players to have.

Let's be clear. The Wizards had played this game 100 times before, and this series, it seems, 1,000 times now. Losing to LeBron, not making it to May again, was becoming their bad ending -- on DVD. They were like that clueless couple that kept renting "Titanic," thinking the boat wouldn't sink this time.

And all the late-game collapses seemed to be their undoing again. This year it almost felt more maddening because there was a real feeling that they had the mojo going in -- and Cleveland, hamstrung by a midseason trade, didn't -- to finally advance past the Cavaliers.

All the usual suspects at the end of the game were in place. Bad shot selection. Some bit-part player in the drama, left alone in the corner. Gibson or Delonte West or, heaven forbid, Damon Jones, cruelly alone with the basketball in their hands and the rim in their sight, misplaced like a set of car keys.

LeBron lowering his shoulder, doing the Patrick Ewing bunny-hop till he either gets to the goal or hears a whistle. And finally that inexorable march toward the offseason, where more questions awaited the players and management.