It wasn't the prettiest of wins but Dallas got just enough from Dirk Nowitzki and Jason Terry to steal game four of the NBA Finals, 86-83, evening the best of seven game series at 2-2.
Despite battling a fever and the effects from his injured finger, Dirk led the Mavericks with 21 points and 11 rebounds. He hit a big lay-up late in the fourth quarter over Udonis Haslem and Dwyane Wade to extend the Dallas lead to three. After a quick dunk by Wade and two free throws by Jason Terry, Miami had one last chance to tie the game. However, the inbounds pass went through Dwyane Wade's hands forcing him to dive into the backcourt to save it to Mike Miller who air-balled a desperation three at the buzzer.
Wade carried Miami's offense for most of the night. finishing with 32 points on 13-20 shooting. Chris Bosh chipped in 24 points and 6 rebounds. Tonight was a banner night for people who disliked LeBron James, as he completely no-showed with 8 points on 3-11 shooting. More troubling was how detached James looked from the game down the stretch and how little he was involved in the offense during crunch time.
Terry was the Mavericks second leading scorer with 17 points and Shawn Marion added 16 of his own. Dallas also got 13 from Tyson Chandler and 11 from DeShawn Stevenson in extended minutes, as the supporting cast provided more of a boost to Dirk than they had in previous games.
Game five will be Thursday night in Dallas. When a series is tied 2-2, the team who wins game five goes on to win the series over 73 percent of the time.