The Last Word on Sports offseason series “NBA Rewind” takes a look back at some of the most memorable performances in NBA history.
After squeaking out a 102-100 road victory in Game 6 of the 1988 NBA Eastern Conference Semifinals, the Boston Celtics returned home for a Game 7 showdown against the Atlanta Hawks. The stage was set for two of the league’s premier scorers, Larry Bird and Dominique Wilkins, to do battle in a winner-take-all series finale.
Needless to say, they did not disappoint.
“We thought we were going to win it that year. We really did,” said Wilkins, in NBA.com’s Oral History of the classic duel with Bird. “We felt good about the way we were playing, particularly the second half of the season. We just grew to have so much confidence in ourselves and each other that we believed we could have won.”
Dominique vs. Bird
The Hawks had reason to feel good after defeating the Celtics in Boston Garden in Game 5 to take a 3-2 series lead back to Atlanta. But Boston fought back, winning a Game 6 nail biter and prompting Larry Bird, never one to mince words, to make a bold prediction in advance of the decisive seventh game.
“They might as well forget it. They’ve got no chance,” Bird said following Game 6. “I think now, we’re going to come out like we did tonight but we’re going to be at home. Our shots are going to be dropping a bit better, we’re going to be running a bit faster; so I’d say Sunday’s going to be a big win for the Celtics.”
The two future Hall of Famers took the floor on May 22, 1988, and delighted NBA fans everywhere with one of the greatest one-on-one duels the game has ever seen. Dominique blitzed the Celtics for 31 points through the first three quarters as Boston clung to a 2-point lead. And although Wilkins would finish strong by adding 16 more points in the fourth, Bird would get the better of him in a vintage clutch performance.
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Bird, who later said that he left the game feeling it was “the best one I ever played”, hit nine of ten shots in the fourth quarter, finishing with 34 points en route to a 118-116 series-clinching victory for the Celtics. Wilkins fell just shy of his playoff career-high with 47 points in the loss.
Bird and Wilkins grabbed the headlines, but the contest also featured notable performances from three players who are currently head coaches in the NBA. Los Angeles Clippers head coach Doc Rivers scored 16 points and dished out 18 assists for the Hawks, while his teammate, current Washington Wizards head coach Randy Wittman, chipped in 22 points on a red-hot 11-13 shooting from the floor. Meanwhile, the Celtics were led by Bird and current Houston Rockets head coach Kevin McHale, whose 33 points and 13 rebounds were instrumental in the Boston victory.
And yet how do most NBA fans remember this epic contest? Simple: Dominique vs. Bird.
“I remember walking off the floor and Bird said we both deserved to win but unfortunately somebody had to go home,” Wilkins reminisced. “It was a series that you could hold your head up and say, ‘You know what? We gave it everything we had.’ Both teams did.”
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