An indelible passage from David Halberstam’s The Breaks of the Game:
It was funny, [Lionel] Hollins said, we were so young and so cocky. Not just the championship year, but even more the year after. We didn’t think there was anyone who could beat us, and we didn’t think it would ever end. We walked out on the court before every game and we couldn’t wait for it to start. In the year after the championship game there had been one game in particular he remembered. Against Milwaukee. Portland had played brilliantly but Milwaukee was good too, and at the half the score was 78-74, with Portland ahead. I mean, Hollins said, it was a game above our levels. Like we were playing in our dreams. In the locker room at halftime Jack had been angry, talking about how we had to tighten up our defense. “Hey, Coach,” Walton had said, “we are playing defense. It’s just that this is a great basketball game. It’s almost perfect. We’re not doing anything wrong, and they’re not doing anything wrong. Enjoy this one, Coach.” Ramsay had nodded and accepted their word. In the second half, Milwaukee finally started missing. “We blew them up. Scored maybe a hundred and forty points that game.” Hollins paused for a moment. “Perhaps we were all too young to have so much happen to us.”