Jerry West is in possession of a peculiar accomplishment that might never be achieved again: he was selected as the most valuable player of the National Basketball Association (NBA) Finals despite being on the losing team. West’s Los Angeles Lakers fell to the Boston Celtics in game seven of the 1969 series despite the heroics of West who averaged 37.9 points, 4.7 rebounds and 7.4 assists. This included a 53-point performance in the first game and a 42-point triple-double in the seventh. The Celtics were spearheaded by John Havlicek who recorded averages of 28.3 points, 11.0 rebounds and 4.4 assists during the series. The team also featured the great Bill Russell in what would be his final playing season after leading the Celtics to 10 championships over 12 seasons. Russell – despite being the true epitome of a most valuable player in a finals format – retired without ever receiving an award that would later bear his name. The reason why: it was only introduced in 1969. West was the winner of the inaugural award.

The NBA can be relatively forgiven. It had only introduced the award and thought it best to give it to a player who put together the most impressive performance regardless of their success. Even West remarked at the time, “The award should have gone to a player on the winning team.”

The NBA never repeated the mistake. It is now a concept so simple in its existence that it could not ever be challenged. To be most valuable is to be most effective and to be most effective is to win. Not even LeBron James with his 35.8 points, 13.3 rebounds and 8.8 assists when he lost in the 2015 NBA Finals could overcome Finals MVP Andre Iguodala’s 16.3 points, 5.8 rebounds and 4.0 assists – the winner of the award was decided by the winner of the series.

56 years later and a principle has surely been set for basketball leagues across the world. Give the award to the winner.

The Illawarra Hawks win their first championship in 24 years. Under the guidance of head coach Justin Tatum – who joined the team midway through 2023–24 with a 2–7 record and has since led the team to a 32–16 record across two seasons – the essential underdog team defeated a perennial champion Melbourne United squad. It was a tough series: the first four games were won by the away team but the Hawks finally secured victory in game five to clinch the series on their home court. The Hawks had been led during the regular season by their backcourt import duo of Tyler Harvey and Trey Kell III but it was ultimately their back-up guard, William “Davo” Hickey, who was the standout player of the series. Hickey posted 14 points, 7 rebounds and 8 assists in game one; 22 points, 6 rebounds and 8 assists in game four; and 21 points, 10 rebounds and 8 assists in game five. It was a remarkable emergence for the former United development player who has been steadily improving ever since he arrived in Illawarra three years ago. What better way to reward an exceptional performance by an unexpected player who was truly the most valuable player for the winning team than with the Finals Most Valuable Player Award in front of his home crowd.

Cue the boos raining down across Wollongong on United’s Matthew Dellavedova when he is announced as the winner. Dellavedova had averaged a respectable 16.2 points, 4.5 rebounds and 6 assists across the series when he arrived for game five and posted a mere 5 points. The NBL went into its damage control afterwards and announced that voting for the most valuable player happens throughout the series and the player with the most votes at the end is the winner; Dellavedova with his consistency across the first four games had earned him more votes than Hickey who had lapses in the second and third games. It was a pitiful spectacle for such an egregious oversight. In such an instance, the player with the highest votes on the winning team should have won.

Instead, one of Australia’s most successful basketball players who is a former NBA champion was gifted with the Jerry West treatment. It was no wonder that the first sentence of Dellavedova’s acceptance speech was, “Davo, this really belongs to you.”

Anybody else should have felt the same.