The Western Conference Finals got off to a legendary start on Monday night when the San Antonio Spurs beat the Oklahoma City Thunder in a double-overtime Game 1 classic. Victor Wembanyama’s 41-point, 24-rebound night gave the round another instant classic and one of the best games of his young career on the biggest stage.
It was a fitting start to the Conference Finals, which is always one of the most intense rounds of the NBA Playoffs. For more stories across basketball and American sport, follow our NBA news and guides and wider US sports news and analysis. Here are three of the best Conference Finals games of all time.
2000 WCF Game 7 – Lakers 89-84 Trail Blazers
Before Shaq and Kobe became the three-peat duo we know today, Portland had them 12 minutes away from disaster.
The Lakers were 3-1 in the 2000 Western Conference Finals before the Trail Blazers won games 5 and 6 and held a 15-point lead in the 4th quarter of Game 7.
Portland had no superstar like Bryant or O’Neal, but they had ridiculous depth. Steve Smith, Rasheed Wallace, Scottie Pippen, Damon Stoudamire, Arvydas Sabonis, and Greg Anthony caused the Lakers all sorts of problems. Shaq struggled to deal with double teams all game before breaking out of jail in the fourth.
‘Diesel’ scored nine points in the fourth. The defining play came when Bryant lobbed the ball to Shaq for a dunk that put LA up 85-79 with 40 seconds left. That alley-oop was the birth of the Lakers dynasty. Four NBA Finals appearances and three rings all birthed from one play that turned the duo from NBA Playoff bottlers to dynasty creators.
2016 WCF Game 6 – Thunder 101-108 Warriors
This was not just any other Conference Finals game. It belongs in the same conversation as the best NBA teams that never got over the hump, because the 73-win Warriors were on the edge of elimination.
This was the last Kevin Durant- and Russell Westbrook-led Thunder team, and they controlled much of Game 6. Durant had 29 points, and Westbrook had 28, but both had head-scratching late-game possessions and turnovers. OKC led by eight going into the fourth quarter. The crowd was on fire, Golden State were almost beaten, then, in Game 6, Klay destroyed all their hopes and dreams.
Thompson hit threes in transition, off movement, with defenders in his face, and from ridiculous distances. It was a true clinic in shot-making. He finished 11-18 from three, setting the playoff record at the time. The game was still close late, then Curry stole the ball from Durant and finished a layup down the other end. There was still a Game 7 to play, but Thompson’s Game 6 outburst really won the series for the Warriors.
1987 ECF Game 5 – Celtics 108-107 Pistons
We’re getting in the time machine for this one. In 1987, when AI didn’t even mean Allen Iverson yet, the defending champions, Boston, took on the emerging Detroit. The Celtics had stars Larry Bird, Kevin McHale, Robert Parish, Dennis Johnson, and Danny Ainge. The Pistons had superstar Isiah Thomas alongside Joe Dumars, Bill Laimbeer, Adrian Dantley, Vinnie Johnson, and a rookie Dennis Rodman.
The series was tied 2-2 coming into Game 5. Late in the game, Detroit were up 107-106, and Boston’s dynasty looked to be fading away. Then, Larry Bird’s famous steal added another year onto it with one legendary play. Thomas was trying to inbound the ball from the baseline. The Celtics legend read the play before it happened, stole the ball, stayed in bounds, and fed the ball to Johnson under the basket.
Boston went 108-107 up after Johnson’s layup, and Bird had shifted the momentum of the whole series in one play. The Celtics were old, injured and under massive pressure. Bird stole the Pistons’ coronation as the top team in the East and threw it in the garbage for another season. The Celtics won the series in seven, and Detroit had to wait until 1989 to win the first of their two rings with Thomas.
That is why the Conference Finals matter so much. A single pass, steal, shooting burst or collapse can change how a team is remembered. The same is true across playoff history, where one decision or absence can shift a whole series, as shown in our look at NBA Playoff suspensions that changed history
