The possession is the story

We remember playoff games as a handful of images, but their tension is built in the empty spaces between them. A switch called early. A rebound tipped twice. A star deciding not to force the shot everyone expects.

The best Game 7s make every possession feel authored. Cleveland and Golden State spent the final minutes of 2016 stripping the game down to nerve. Toronto and Philadelphia turned four bounces into an eternity. Milwaukee and Brooklyn stretched a shoe-length into basketball folklore.

The final play becomes the headline, but the possessions before it are the story. Rewatch those, and the famous ending feels less like fate than the last link in a chain everyone on the floor helped forge.