24. 2006 Miami Heat
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Year 2 of the Shaquille O’Neal and Dwyane Wade combination produced Miami’s first championship. In Year 1, the Heat won 59 games and stormed through the first two rounds of the playoffs — sweeping both the Nets and Wizards — before falling in seven games to the Detroit Pistons. In December of Year 2, Pat Riley replaced Stan Van Gundy as the head coach in December and led the Heat to glory. Miami avenged its loss to Detroit in the Eastern Conference Finals, defeating the powerhouse Pistons in six games.
In the NBA Finals — a series marred by questionable officiating that favored Miami — the Heat overcame an 0-2 hole and knocked off Dallas in six games. Wade became a true superstar this season and Shaq remained a high-end player, though he was no longer at his best. Aside from those two, however, the rest of the roster doesn’t stack up to the rest of the champions since 2000. Jason ‘White Chocolate’ Williams (12.3 PPG) and Antoine Walker (12.2) were the team’s third and fourth leading scorers. Alonzo Mourning and Gary Payton contributed off the bench but both players were shells of their former selves.
