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1992 Chicago Bulls: Jordan’s 2nd Championship

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1991 had been a breakthrough year for Michael Jordan, as he won the first championship of his career. The sequel was even better. The 1992 Chicago Bulls repeated as champs and were the best edition of the great Jordan squads in the early part of the 1990s.

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It was business as usual for Jordan in 1992. He poured in 30ppg, while shooting 52 percent, averaging six rebounds and six assists and being 1st-team All-Defense. He won the third MVP of his career and his second in a row.

Scottie Pippen had officially come into his own as a running mate, making 2nd-team All-NBA, and averaging a 21/8/7 line. Horace Grant manned the low post and put up 14 points/10 rebounds per night.

The Bulls did not have exceptional depth and were heavily dependent on Jordan, and to a lesser extent Pippen, to be great each night. But they had some functionable contributors. B.J. Armstrong ran the floor show and John Paxson could knock down a three-ball when you needed it. Bill Cartwright and Stacey King helped out up front.

Chicago wasted no time blazing out of the gate, with a 14-game winning streak in November. By the end of January, they were 37-7 and running away from the rest of the league. There was a brief dip in February when the Bulls lost four of six on a road trip West. They also dropped a tough one-point game to the Cleveland Cavaliers, the best challenger in the East.

But the beginning of March saw the Bulls blow out Western Conference frontrunner Portland 111-191. It kick started a 14-2 stretch that helped Chicago close the year with a 67-15 record, clearing the field by ten games.

The Miami Heat, with a 38-44 record were the cannon fodder served up in a first round that was a best-of-five series at this time. The Heat had good players in Glen Rice, who scored 22 ppg and Rony Seikaly, who averaged 16/12. But they were a very young roster, with no notable players older than 26-years-old.

Jordan set the tone immediately, shooting 21-for-34 and dropping 46 in a Game 1 blowout. He went off for 33/13 in Game 2, as Pippen added 30 more and the Bulls again cruised to an easy win. After taking the first two games by a combined 49 points, Game 3 on the road was tougher. Miami led 33-19 at the first quarter break, but Jordan still went off for 56 points, Pippen poured in 31 more and the 119-114 win closed the series.

Chicago’s stumbling block in 1989 and 1990 had been The Bad Boy Detroit Pistons, and a 1991 sweep of the Pistons had been the signature moment in the first championship run. A fourth straight showdown was looming, but instead of an old rival, the Bulls found a new one. The New York Knicks, led by Pat Riley, knocked off Detroit and began a blood feud with the Bulls that would last for the next three years.

New York was anchored by center Patrick Ewing and renowned for an extremely physical style of play, one that has since been clamped down on by the league in the interest of allowing offense to flow more freely. While Jordan got 31 in the opener, he didn’t get help, while Ewing went off for 34/16 and the Knicks stole homecourt advantage with a 94-89 upset.

Jordan hit 12-for-24 shots in the second game, again the only notable contributor on offense. This time the Chicago defense forced 23 turnovers and evened the series 86-78. In Game 3 at Madison Square Garden, Jordan again shot 12-for-24, knocking down 27. This time Pippen joined him with 26 in a 94-86 win. Chicago had a chance to put a stranglehold on the series in Game 4 and led by a point going into the fourth quarter. But they were crushed on the boards, got another poor game from Pippen and lost 93-86. But the Bulls had reclaimed homecourt as the series hit its crunch point.

Chicago’s defense was the story in Game 5, holding Ewing to 14 points/5 rebounds, while Jordan efficiently knocked down 37 in a 96-88 win. Game 6 saw Jordan have his worst performance of the series, going 9-for-25. Pippen was 5-for-15 and the result was a decisive 100-86 loss that forced a Game 7.

The greatest player of all time on his home floor is virtually unbeatable in the NBA and so it was on this Sunday afternoon in old Chicago Stadium. Jordan poured in 42. Pippen had his best game of the series, with a 17/11/11 line. The Bulls held the Knicks to 38% from the floor and coasted into the conference finals with a 110-81 win.

Cleveland was waiting in the conference finals, having survived a seven-game test of their own against the Boston Celtics. The Cavs had a deep and balanced team, led by prolific center Brad Daugherty and sharpshooting guard Mark Price. But Chicago was ready for the first game of this series. Pippen knocked down 29 and grabbed 12 rebounds, while Grant chipped in a 12/10 line. And…ho-hum, Jordan hit for 33 in a comfortable 103-89 win.

Jordan and Pippen both shot poorly in Game 2, a game the Bulls essentially no-showed and were blown out. Once again, they would need to win a middle game of a series on the road and once again, they did it right away in Game 3. Chicago attacked the glass and outrebounded the bigger Cavs. Jordan got 36, while Pippen was exquisite, with a 23/9/7 line. Grant added 15/11 and the 105-96 win put the Bulls back in charge of the series.

Everyone but Jordan seemed to take off for Game 4. Michael got his 35, but Cleveland’s balance gave them a 99-85 win, and the fifth game back in Chicago was tight into the fourth quarter. Chicago showed its championship pedigree. Grant and Pippen would combine for 29 rebounds, keying a decisive edge on the glass. It supported Jordan’s 37 and the close game turned into a 112-89 blowout.

Game 6 was another tight one going into the fourth quarter, but this time the Bulls would not let the series go any further. They forced Price into a miserable 5-for-18 shooting night. Pippen finished his excellent series with 29/12, while Jordan delivered a 29/8/8 line. The 99-94 win gave Chicago its second straight trip to the NBA Finals.

The opponent was the Portland Trail Blazers. The Blazers had been in the Finals in 1990 and in 1991 been the West’s top regular season team before being knocked off by the Lakers. In 1992, Portland was again the West’s #1 seed and this time they validated in the playoffs.

Much like Cleveland, Portland was deeper and more balanced than Chicago. Unlike Cleveland—or anyone else—they had their own superstar guard, 6’7” Clyde Drexler, who joined Jordan as 1st-team All-NBA. The theory went that Drexler could negate Jordan, or at least minimize his control of the series and the Blazers could win everywhere else on the floor. That was the theory anyway.

The theory came crashing down in the first quarter of Game 1, as an offended Jordan banged him six three-point shots and turned to the NBC broadcast table where Magic Johnson was calling the game and shrugged his shoulders. “The Shrug” remains an iconic NBA moment.

Jordan ended the night with 39 points, while Drexler struggled to shoot 5-for-14. Pippen scored 24 and dished 10 assists in the 122-89 rout.

To his credit, Drexler bounced back with 26 in Game 2. Jordan scored 39 more, but his supporting cast disappeared and Chicago lost in overtime. For the third straight round, the Bulls would need a road win in the middle of a series. And given that the NBA Finals format was 2-3-2 from 1985 thru 2013, Chicago would need two road wins to avoid coming home with their back to the wall.

Defense carried the Bulls on the road in Game 3. They held the Blazers to 38 percent shooting. While Drexler had a nice 32/9 night, it was Chicago who played the relatively balanced game, with Jordan, Pippen and Grant all playing well and leading a 94-84 win. When the Bulls held a three-point lead going into the fourth quarter of Game 4, it looked like they might be ready to duplicate their feat of 1991, when they went into Los Angeles tied at a game apiece and swept three in a row.

But Chicago got beat on the boards down the stretch in Game 4 and lost 93-88, setting up a big Game 5. It was statement time again for the two stars. Jordan poured in 46. Drexler got 30, but also shot just 9-for-21. The Bulls led by thirteen after the first quarter and held serve the rest of the way in a 119-106 win.

The Game 5 win effectively ended the Finals, although the Blazers did come back to Chicago and led by 15 after three quarters in Game 6. Drexler, Terry Porter and Jerome Kersey combined for 70 points, while the Jordan-Pippen parlay went for “only” 59. But at the right time, Chicago got production from an X factor. John Paxson hit six of nine shots from the floor, scored 13 points and was the difference-maker as the Bulls pulled out a 97-93 win and got the celebration underway.

Jordan averaged 36 points/5 rebounds/7 assists per game, while shooting 53 percent in the 1992 NBA Finals. It was an easy MVP decision. Drexler had a respectable line of 25/8/5, but his 41 percent shooting was the biggest difference between him and Jordan.

Chicago certainly wasn’t finished. They came back in 1993 and won a third straight title. Jordan took a couple years off to try his hand at minor league baseball, then returned in the late 1990s and ripped off three more championships in succession. The Jordan Dynasty can essentially be separated into a first term and a second term. The 1992 team was the best of Jordan’s First Term.

1992 Sports: An Epic Shot & A Repeat Barrage

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This article offers a snapshot of 1992 sports, a year defined by an epic shot in the NCAA Tournament, and a parade of teams either closing repeat titles, getting close to doing such, or starting repeat runs.

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The Shot Heard ‘Round The World: To a previous generation this phrase means Bobby Thomson’s walkoff home run to win the 1951 National League pennant for the New York Giants. To another generation it’s the dramatic end to the Duke-Kentucky regional final in the NCAA Tournament.

Duke was the #1 seed in the East and the favorite to win repeat national titles, a feat not done since the UCLA dynasty. Kentucky was back in the limelight, after a brief stretch in the NCAA doghouse, and rebuilt by Rick Pitino. The Wildcats were the #2 seed, and the two teams squared off in Philadelphia.

For forty minutes of regulation and then 4:58 of overtime, the game already earned a special place in college basketball lore. Bobby Hurley scored 22 and dished 10 assists for Duke. Jamal Mashburn scored 28 and grabbed 10 rebounds for Kentucky. It was the Wildcats that took a 103-102 lead with two seconds left. Then came the play that’s now shown on highlight reels every March.

Duke’s Grant Hill, already with six assists to go with ten rebounds,  took the ball under his own basketball and rifled a three-quarters court bullet pass that national Player of the Year Christian Laettner caught, as the Kentucky defenders did not contest the pass. Laettner was 9-for-9 from the floor when he caught the pass and had scored 29 points. By the time he finished coming down, spinning and putting up a turnaround jumper from the foul line, you could make that 10-for-10 with 31 points and one of college basketball’s great finishes.

The Final Four was still ahead and it was a good one, as Duke turned back a stiff challenge from Indiana, and had to pull away from Michigan in the second half to win their second straight national title. But the play, and the game everyone remembers took place in Philadelphia. Click here to read a complete account of the 1992 Final Four.

The Fab Five: Michigan reached the NCAA final, and doing it as a 6-seed made it surprising, but not necessarily historic on its face. Kansas, after all, had won a national title in 1988 out of the 6-hole and N.C. State did the same in 1983. But those teams had senior leadership. Michigan was different—they started five freshman, the first team ever to do so and reach the national championship game.

Chris Webber and Jalen Rose would go on to have solid NBA careers, and Juwan Howard a pretty good one. Jimmy King and Ray Jackson didn’t have an impact at the pro level, but were solid college players. Together, they made history in Ann Arbor.

Michigan had to beat the top two seeds in the Southeast Regional at Lexington, ironically the same site the Wolverines had to go through en route to the 1989 NCAA title. Rose scored 25 points and grabbed 11 rebounds, while holdover Eric Riley put up a 15/10 in the win over 2-seed Oklahoma State.

Then it was overtime against top seed Ohio State, the biggest non-football game these two archrivals have ever played. Rose was again strong, with 20 points and he was the regional’s Most Outstanding Player. Webber posted a 23/11 and Michigan survived, 75-71.

At the Final Four, the Wolverines survived Cincinnati, and led Duke by a point at the half before the dream finally ended. But what a historic ride it was.

Jordan Goes Back-To-Back: Repeat championships were the order of the day in basketball, not just in college, but at the NBA. Michael Jordan’s Bulls had joined Duke in making 1991 their breakthrough year, and now the Bulls joined the Blue Devils in ratifying their place in history in 1992.

Chicago dominated the regular season with 67 wins, thanks to Jordan’s 30 ppg and he won his third MVP award. The Bulls got one stiff challenge in the playoffs, when Pat Riley’s New York Knicks took them to seven games in the second round, but otherwise, Chicago was mostly in control and sealed their second straight title by beating Portland four games to two. Click here to read a complete account of the 1992 NBA Finals.

Seven-Game Battles In The East: We mentioned Chicago and New York going at it for the full seven games in the NBA’s Eastern Conference semi-finals. They weren’t the only ones. The Cleveland Cavaliers and Boston Celtics also went the distance, as the Eastern semis provided the 1992 NBA postseason its strongest element of drama.

The Knicks had been taken over Pat Riley, the head coach of the Showtime-era Los Angeles Lakers. They were built around Patrick Ewing in the middle, who’d averaged 24 points/11 rebounds a game, and a good point in now-Golden State head coach Mark Jackson, who distributed eight assists a night. Xavier McDaniel, Gerald Wilkins and John Starks filled in the gaps, and the Knicks relied heavily on a physical brand of defense.

Jordan did not have a deep supporting cast around him. Scottie Pippen averaged 21 ppg and was an excellent defender, but beyond Horace Grant’s rebounding, the Bulls were dependent on their star. New York got 34 points/11 rebounds from Ewing in the opener, as the Knicks swiped Game 1 and took homecourt advantage.

Chicago won Game 2 and then reclaimed homecourt edge with a 94-86 win in Game 3, as Jordan and Pippen were too much for Ewing, who didn’t get any help. The Knicks turned around and dominated the fourth quarter of Game 4 though, tying up the series.

The Bulls’ defense contained Ewing in Game 5 and Jordan lit up Chicago Stadium for 37 points in a eight-point win, but New York again owned the fourth quarter at Madison Square Garden, pulling away to win Game 6.

Game 7 was tight for the first half and Chicago only led by five. But it was Jordan’s day, and he racked up 42 points, with the Bulls pulling away to a 110-81 win.

Cleveland had the misfortune of being in Jordan’s conference at the time of his rise, but this was a good 57-win basketball team that had Brad Daugherty in the post, Larry Nance at forward and sharpshooter Mark Price on the perimeter.

Boston was at an in-between point in their history. They still got contributions from Robert Parish and Kevin McHale, and when Larry Bird’s back allowed him on the floor, the Legend averaged 20 ppg. The Celtics were led though, by up-and-comer Reggie Lewis and his 21 ppg, and other new faces like Kevin Gamble, Dee Brown and current Denver Nuggets coach Brian Shaw.

Bird’s back was ailing badly by this point in the season and he was coming off the bench for limited minutes. Daugherty slapped up a 26/17 game in the opener, keyed a big Cleveland rebounding edge and a 101-76 rout. But behind the mix of the old and new—27 from Parish and 26 from Lewis—the Celts took Game 2, 104-98.

Boston nearly took complete control of the series back at the Garden. Parish and Ed Pinckney led a decisive rebounding effort that resulted in a 110-107 win. Game 4 went to overtime, but the Cavs got a combined 78 points from Nance, Price and Daugherty and escaped, 114-112.

Daugherty’s 28/9 performance led Cleveland to an easy rout in Game 5. Then Bird came into the starting lineup and gave his team 37 minutes in Game 6, as the Celts came back with a rout of their own.

It was time for another Game 7 and Bird did start and give 30-plus minutes. But Daugherty again had a 28/9 game on his home floor and Cleveland’s fast start held, en route to a 122-104 win.

Cleveland gave Chicago a fight, but the Bulls were able to close out in six games, with the security of a home Game 7 still in their back pocket. It was the second round of the Eastern Conference playoffs where the drama was in 1992.

How Bout ‘Dem Cowboys: The Dallas Cowboys considered themselves the NFL’s proudest franchise, but they hadn’t won the Super Bowl since 1977, nor been there since 1978. They hadn’t even played for the NFC Championship since 1982, when they lost a great battle in San Francisco. Perhaps it was appropriate then, that the signature moment on the way back to glory came in Frisco.

Dallas had reached the second round of the playoffs in 1991 and they opened ’92 by sending a loud and clear message to the rest of the league, with a 23-10 thumping of defending Super Bowl champion Washington on Monday night football, a game not nearly as competitive as the score makes it sound.

The Cowboys were 6-1 and playing a key regular season game against Philadelphia the only team to beat them in the early going. An Eagle win would pull them into a tie for first and give them the tiebreaker. Dallas trailed 7-3 in the third quarter and it was tied 10-10 in the final period, but behind 163 rushing yards from Emmitt Smith, Dallas churned out a 23-10 win and they never looked back in the division. They finished the season 13-3 and got the #2 seed in the NFC.

Philadelphia awaited again in the second round of the playoffs, after Dallas rested up with a first-round bye. Troy Aikman threw two first-half touchdown passes , the Cowboys built up a 17-3 lead and coasted 34-10.

That set up the battle with top-seeded San Francisco in a battle between the two teams considered the best in football. The two offenses alone combined for 13 Pro Bowlers and each was in the top five of the NFL defensively.  In the first half, the battle looked even as the teams went to the locker room tied 10-10.

It was the Cowboys who delivered the blows coming out in the second half, driving for a touchdown immediately after kickoff and taking a 24-13 lead into the early part of the fourth quarter. But San Francisco came back with a short touchdown pass from Young to Jerry Rice, and when the Cowboys were pinned back inside their own 20, the Bay Area crowd still had hope.

Aikman threw a simple slant over the middle to Alvin Harper. The receiver broke through and turned it into a huge play, taking it all the way down inside the 49er 10-yard line. A short touchdown pass by Aikman sealed the 30-20 victory. Ultimately, turnovers were the difference, with Dallas playing mistake-free while San Francisco gave it away four times.

The Cowboys were favored to win the Super Bowl over the Buffalo Bills and they did just that. After a somewhat rocky start, the turnover edge from the NFC Championship Game turned into the turnover landslide of the Super Bowl. Dallas forced a Super Bowl record nine, and rolled to a 52-17 win. They were back atop the NFL world, and it wouldn’t be for the last time with this cast of characters. Click here to read a complete account of the 1992 Super Bowl.

Toronto Breaks Through: The World Series trophy had yet to live the confines of the United States. The Montreal Expos spent the first half of the 1980s knocking on the door, but never breaking through. The Toronto Blue Jays took up the mantle of Canada starting in 1985, but hadn’t made it over the top.

The Blue Jays got unexpectedly tough battles in the AL East, with both the Milwaukee Brewers and Baltimore Orioles overachieving and hanging in the race to the final week. Toronto went out and acquired starting pitcher David Cone at the trade deadline to shore up the weakest area of their team, and they hung on.

Toronto faced Oakland in the American League Championship Series, but the A’s weren’t quite as awe-inspiring as the team that beat the Blue Jays in the 1989 ALCS. The big moment came in Game 4. The Blue Jays lead the series 2-1, but were trailing this game by a 6-1 count after six innings and the A’s had MVP closer Dennis Eckersley awaiting.

Instead, it was second baseman Roberto Alomar who took over. He doubled to start a three-run rally in the eighth. Then he beat Eckersley with a two-run homer in the ninth to tie it. Toronto won 7-6 in eleven innings and eventually closed it out in six games. Alomar hit .423 for the series and was named ALCS MVP.

The World Series was now in Canada for the first time, and this close to the prize, the Blue Jays didn’t let it slip from their grasp. They beat the Atlanta Braves in six games to bring home the championship. Click here to read a game-by-game account of the 1992 World Series.

NLCS Epic: It was the bottom of the ninth inning in Game 7, and the Atlanta Braves trailed the Pittsburgh Pirates 2-0. How it gotten to this point, the Braves must have surely wondered.

It was a rematch of the previous year’s NLCS, where Atlanta had upset Pittsburgh with consecutive road wins in Games 6 & 7. Now the Pirates were trying to return the favor.

Atlanta had gotten off to a great start in this NLCS, winning the opener 5-1 behind John Smoltz and then routing Pittsburgh 13-5 in Game 2. It was a then-unknown knuckleballer named Tim Wakefield who settled things down for the Pirates, winning Game 3 by a 3-2 count. Atlanta took Game 4 thanks to four hits from Otis Nixon, but Pittsburgh stayed alive with a 7-1 in Game 5. Ironically, that was the same score by which the Pirates won Game 5 of the 1979 World Series, another elimination setting that still sent them on the road needing two more.

The Pirates looked ready to wake up the echoes of ’79, when they blasted Tom Glavine for eight second-inning runs in Game 6, making Wakefield’s second series win an easy one. Then Pittsburgh ace Doug Drabek took that 2-0 lead into the ninth inning the next night and the comeback was just about complete.

But Terry Pendleton opened with a double down the line. An error and a walk loaded the bases and got Drabek out of the game. A sac fly and another walk had the bases reloaded and the score now 2-1. Pittsburgh closer Stan Belinda got Brian Hunter to pop out, and now all that was left was unknown pinch-hitter Francisco Cabrera.

Cabrera lashed a single to left, and Barry Bonds, playing his final year in the Steel City came up throwing. But his arm wasn’t good enough to throw out slow-footed Sid Bream who came around from second base with the game’s winning run. Atlanta was going back to the World Series. Pittsburgh hasn’t back to the postseason—nor even had a winning season—since.

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Alabama Returns To The Top: The Alabama football program hadn’t won a national title in the post-Bear Bryant era and only occasionally had they even challenged for one. That finally changed under Gene Stallings. Though the Tide didn’t have a demanding schedule, they kept winning, and when that included a victory over a good Florida team in the first-ever SEC Championship Game—the first conference championship game in college football history, Alabama got a crack at top-ranked Miami in the Sugar Bowl.

‘Bama  shocked the nation by not simply beating Miami, but routing the ‘Canes, 34-13. Under the leadership of Gene Stallings, and a stalwart defense, they were back atop the college football world. Click here to read a complete account of the 1992 Sugar Bowl.

The Penguins Join The Repeat Barrage: We’ve seen that Duke and the Chicago Bulls both repeated. The Toronto Blue Jays and Dallas Cowboys set the stage for doing the same in 1993. Miami football came within one game of doing so. With this seemingly as the theme for 1992, should we be surprised that it extended to the NHL?

Pittsburgh was led by the goal-scoring trio of Mario Lemieux, Kevin Stevens and Joe Mullen, and though they started the playoffs slow, the Pens eventually got postseason fire. They won their final 11 games, including a sweep of the Chicago Blackhawks to hoist the Cup.  Click here to read a more complete account of the 1992 Stanley Cup Finals and the playoff ride of the ’92 Penguins. 

The 1992 NBA Finals: Jordan Shrugs His Way To Another Title

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The Chicago Bulls were looking for a repeat championship in the 1992 NBA Finals. The Portland Trail Blazers were no strangers to the big stage themselves, having reached the Finals in 1990 before losing to the Detroit Pistons. The question for the postseason was, could anyone slow down Chicago?

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Michael Jordan averaged 30 ppg in 1992 and won the MVP award. The Bulls won 67 games, ten more than anyone else in the league. But the Eastern Conference playoffs didn’t go quite as smoothly.

Chicago was pushed to seven games by the up-and-coming New York Knicks of Pat Riley, and then split the first four games against the Cleveland Cavaliers in the conference finals before taking the series in six games.

Portland had the talent to match up with Chicago. They were built around a great backcourt of Terry Porter and Clyde Drexler. Porter averaged 18 ppg, and Drexler was a terrific all-around talent who went 6’7” and averaged 25 points/6 rebounds/6 assists. The Blazers had a good interior rebounding trio of Jerome Kersey, Buck Williams and Kevin Duckworth.

With the Bulls having shown some vulnerability, the question now shifted to whether Drexler could at least come close to cancelling out Jordan, and then allow Portland’s superior supporting cast—beyond the all-around talent of Scottie Pippen and the rebounding prowess of Horace Grant, Jordan didn’t have a lot of help—to prevail.

If Jordan’s game had a weakness it was three-point shooting. He hit 51 percent behind the arc, but only 27 percent on the three-ball. In Game 1, the theory of giving him the trey, and the theory that he and Drexler could cancel each other out, went into the trash. Jordan was electric, hitting six straight three-pointers in the first quarter. At one point he turned and simply shrugged, a brief move that’s now a part of NBA lore.  Jordan finished with 39 points and the Bulls took a 122-89 rout.

Jordan had 39 more in Game 2, but unlike Game 1, Pippen struggled, shooting 6-for-19, and Portland got a big road win, 115-104. Just as the Blazers had in 1990, they would go home for the middle three games with homecourt advantage.

Drexler did what he could to help the cause, scoring 32 points in Game 3, but this time it was balance from Chicago that made the difference. Jordan knocked down 26 and the Bulls got 18 apiece from Pippen and Grant in a 94-84 win. Portland came out in Game 4 and played like a desperate team. The trailed in the fourth quarter, but hit the boards hard and rallied. The Blazers outrebounded the Bulls 45-33 and eventually won 93-88. It’s perhaps indicative of where this series was headed though, that this was the only game where Portland’s superior inside personnel produced a significant edge on the glass.

Game 5 provided the other big difference in the series and it was that between Jordan and Drexler. The latter was an extremely good player and he scored 30 points in the biggest game of his career. But he shot 9-for-21, and while that’s not bad, it’s not great. Meanwhile, Jordan knocked down 46 and did it on ruthlessly efficient 14-of-23 shooting. It was, for all practical purposes, the game that settled the series and the game that finished the theory of the two off-guards being on the same level.

There was still time for some more magic. Portland looked like they would force a Game 7 when they took a 15-point lead in the fourth quarter of Game 6. Drexler got his points, with 24, but again failed to do it efficiently, shooting 8-of-24.  Jordan, taking the same 24 shots, produced 33 points and the Bulls put on a big rally and won 97-93.

Chicago had its second straight title, and they were just getting started.