Game 6 Mania

Okay, Game 6 of the NBA Finals tonight and the Mavericks are a loss away from elimination. People of Miami, stay away from my house; I ask this for your own good. It took me a while to get wound up about the Finals, but now that I am, I am insanely gung-ho. In case you're wondering just how gung ho, I spent the afternoon driving around town, ripping up posters for the new Miami Vice movie. Then I fed-exed Dwayne Wade a jug of 8 year-old milk with a hand-painted label on it that read, "Basketball Medicine". I can't imagine how I'd react if I came face-to-face with an actual Miamite, but the next day, you might find a freshly-dug hole in my backyard and suspicious claw marks all over my face.

Since this could very well be my last chance to write about basketball for a few months, I feel like I really need to work the mojo tonight. I would never risk the a jinxing before such an important game, but I predict the following for tonight:
- Mark Cuban, who's been up for 48 straight hours sending death threats to David Stern via MySpace, stumbles his way to the arena before the game
- Cuban corners Dirk in the trainer's room and says, "Win or Stern's putting a bullet in my head!"
- Dirk, unable to handle the pressure, breaks down in uncontrollable sobs in front of his teammates
- Dirk then insists on spending the first half of the game alone in the locker room, listening to the Indigo Girls and eating Cherry Garcia ice cream
- Meanwhile, the rest of the team adopts the chant "Win one for the Euro Pansy".
- While outwardly excited, each player is a little conflicted at the thought of calling their star player a Euro Pansy
- The Heat take advantage, ringing up a 52 point first half lead
- When the team gets back to the locker room, Dirk meekly asks, "Does anyone have any more Cherry Garcia?"
- His teammates refuse to look at him.
- Avery Johnson, seeing his last chance to rally the team, tells Dirk, "Shaquille O'Neal stole it. He took it and then he said, 'They don't make ice cream like this in German! And their women are very homely.'"
- Dirk, overcome with fury, rips his jersey in two and throws a basketball through the wall.
- The second half begins and the Mavericks stage an improbable rally.

Will they win? I refuse to say. All I will say is that you don't touch another man's Cherry Garcia.