<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">MIAMI -- It was the final two minutes of the final game and he was playing without his headband and with five fouls and with the ugly roar of boos raining down on any good he did for his team. So what did Rasheed Wallace do? He did more of it. He hit two free throws to put the Pistons ahead by one. He grabbed a rebound off a Dwyane Wade miss. He followed a Tayshaun Prince miss and banked it back in, giving the Pistons a three-point lead with 55 seconds left. Then he helped tie up Wade to force a jump ball. The boos continued, the scowls were all around, he was the villain everywhere in the arena -- maybe everywhere in America that doesn't have a Great Lake around it -- but he was a hero in Detroit. Whose basketball team, by the way, has a few more games to play. It goes on. The quest. The reputation. The words "defending champions" after "Detroit Pistons." Here in the land of hurricanes and alligators, the Pistons' defense of their NBA crown, thought to be dangling off a pirate ship's plank, survived the last squall, it will play for another title. It took punches, it was bruised and dizzy. But it stands this morning, the crown still on its head, thanks to an exhausting 88-82 Game 7 victory over Miami. And it is marching down to Texas, to face the final challenge in the war they call a championship. Heat. Beat.</div> Source
