The Toronto Raptors star capped a historic postseason by reaching a historic achievement as the first player to win Finals MVP with a team from each conference. Leonard earned the honor following the Raptors' 114-110 victory in Game 6 to close out a 4-2 series win.
The 2019 NBA Finals ended just as cruel as it played, with an entirely anti-climactic finish in what could have been one of the most memorable moments in NBA history. After Kevin Durant tore his Achilles in Game 5 and Klay Thompson suffered a serious knee injury in Game 6, the Warriors had the Raptors right where they wanted — down just one point with 9.6 seconds to play and the ball. In front of a home crowd in their final viewing at Oracle Arena, Steph Curry caught the ball from deep and launched a three-pointer look that could only have been scripted better by Shonda Rhimes.
It seemed like it was meant to be.
In the third quarter of Game 6 of the NBA Finals, Klay Thompson went up for a dunk, after he’d erupted for a barrage of threes to put the Warriors in the lead. Sadly, he landed awkwardly and bent his knee in such a way that left him on the floor, sitting there as all of Oracle Arena fell silent. After the game, ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski confirmed that he tore his ACL.
TORONTO — When Kevin Durant went down on the court early in the second quarter with an apparent Achilles injury, the first person I thought about was Kevin Garnett. When you cover a championship team you tend to view most things through the prism of that experience.
The emerging narrative Kev
Sports dynasties die slowly, and then all at once. There are a million little signposts we’ll retrofit onto the Warriors’ demise should it come either Monday night (Game 5 is at 9 p.m. ET on ABC) or later this week. The fraught relationship between the team and Kevin Durant has seemingly deepened since Durant has been unable to play while teammates DeMarcus Cousins, Klay Thompson, and Kevon Looney are all playing hurt. Everyone seems to be saying the right things, but there is enough smoke from the well-established Bay Area media to suggest something’s amiss. (How fitting that a team led by Kawhi Leonard would potentially take advantage of tumult over disagreements on the viability of playing with an injury.)
“Don’t be scared.”
TORONTO — Coming off the floor at Oracle Arena, having taken two games from the two-time defending champs on their floor and heading home with the knowledge that they were one win away from securing an NBA championship, the Raptors showed us nothing. No laughter, no smiles, not even a fist pump or a high-five.
