NBA Finals
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50 free NBA Finals trivia questions with answers — sports quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
The NBA Finals has decided the league champion every spring since 1947, and it has a habit of producing moments that outlive the box score: a star playing through illness, a title won on the road in a seventh game, a dynasty stopped one win short. The Celtics, Lakers, Bulls and Warriors run through its history, but so do one-time winners and unlikely heroes. This quiz covers the champions year by year, the Finals MVP winners, the great upsets and comebacks, the coaches behind the dynasties, and the trophies, formats and oddities that surround the series. Questions range from recent title teams back to the league's earliest seasons. It is written for basketball fans who want to test how well they know the title winners, and for quiz hosts who need accurate questions with answers. Every question comes with a short explanation, so a miss still leaves you with a story worth retelling.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01What did Lakers owner Jack Kent Cooke hang from the Forum rafters before Game 7 of the 1969 NBA Finals?
Balloons
Balloons printed with 'World Champion Lakers' hung overhead, ready to fall at the final buzzer. Boston's players spotted them during warm-ups and won the game by two points.
Q 02Which Chicago Bulls star scored 38 points while badly ill in the 1997 NBA Finals 'Flu Game'?
Michael Jordan
Michael Jordan later blamed food poisoning from a late-night pizza, not flu. He played 44 minutes and collapsed into a teammate's arms once the win was safe.
Q 03Which injured center walked out during warm-ups for Game 7 of the 1970 NBA Finals at Madison Square Garden?
Willis Reed
Willis Reed had torn a thigh muscle in Game 5 and sat out Game 6. He scored only the home team's first two baskets, yet the lift carried it to a first championship.
Q 04Which rookie started at center in place of an injured star and scored 42 points to clinch the 1980 NBA Finals?
Magic Johnson
Magic Johnson, a 6-foot-9 point guard, jumped center because the Lakers' usual big man had a badly swollen ankle. He added 15 rebounds and seven assists in Philadelphia.
Q 05Which team won its first NBA Finals in 2019, clinching in the farewell game at Oracle Arena?
Toronto Raptors
Toronto Raptors became the first team based outside the United States to win the title, beating Golden State in six games.
Q 06Which team erased a 3–1 deficit in the 2016 NBA Finals to end its city's 52-year title drought?
Cleveland Cavaliers
Cleveland Cavaliers became the first team to overcome a 3–1 deficit in the Finals. They beat a Golden State side that had set a record with 73 regular-season wins.
Q 07Where was every game of the 2020 NBA Finals played, inside a fan-free quarantine bubble?
Walt Disney World
Walt Disney World's ESPN sports complex in Florida hosted the whole restart of the season. The bubble recorded no COVID-19 cases among the participating teams.
Q 08Which Lakers guard is the only player named NBA Finals MVP while on the losing team, in 1969?
Jerry West
Jerry West had 42 points, 13 rebounds and 12 assists in the Game 7 defeat to Boston, and took home the first Finals MVP award ever presented.
Q 09Whose corner three-pointer with 5.2 seconds left forced overtime in Game 6 of the 2013 NBA Finals?
Ray Allen
Ray Allen stepped back to the right corner after a teammate grabbed an offensive rebound. Miami won in overtime, then took Game 7 for a second straight title.
Q 10The NBA Finals MVP trophy was renamed in 2009 for which 11-time champion Celtics center?
Bill Russell
Bill Russell never won the award himself: it was first presented in 1969, his last season as a player, and went to an opponent.
Q 11Which Lakers coach owns the trademark on 'three-peat', a word his players used chasing a third straight NBA title?
Pat Riley
Pat Riley's Lakers fell short of that third title in 1989, but his company collected royalties when Chicago completed a three-peat of its own in 1993.
Q 12Which Lakers forward lost eight NBA Finals, then retired nine games into the 1971–72 championship season?
Elgin Baylor
Elgin Baylor quit because of nagging injuries, and the Lakers' very next game began a record 33-game winning streak on the way to the 1972 title.
Q 13Which team lost back-to-back NBA Finals to the Chicago Bulls in 1997 and 1998, both in six games?
Utah Jazz
Q 21Which forward was named NBA Finals MVP with San Antonio in 2014 and with a second franchise in 2019?
Kawhi Leonard
Kawhi Leonard had been traded to his second club only the previous summer, after reportedly asking to be sent to the Lakers instead.
Q 22Which Lakers guard was named 2010 NBA Finals MVP despite shooting 6-for-24 in the deciding Game 7?
Kobe Bryant
Kobe Bryant scored 10 of his game-high 23 points in the fourth quarter as the Lakers edged Boston 83–79 for his fifth ring.
Q 23Which San Antonio big man finished two blocks short of a quadruple-double in the 2003 NBA Finals clincher?
Tim Duncan
Tim Duncan piled up 21 points, 20 rebounds, 10 assists and 8 blocks against New Jersey, sending a retiring Hall of Fame teammate out as a champion.
Utah Jazz held home-court advantage in 1998 and still lost, as Chicago sealed its third straight title and its sixth in eight seasons.
Q 14Who became the first player named NBA Finals MVP with three different franchises, completing the set in 2020?
LeBron James
LeBron James won the award twice with Miami, once with his home-state team and once with the Lakers. Only one player has more than his four.
Q 15Which team, nicknamed the Bad Boys, swept the Lakers in the 1989 NBA Finals and repeated in 1990?
Detroit Pistons
Detroit Pistons had waited longer than any other founding franchise: they were the last of the NBA's 'Original Eight' charter teams to win a championship.
Q 16Which forward hit the winning basket in Game 4 of the 2011 NBA Finals despite a 101-degree fever?
Dirk Nowitzki
Dirk Nowitzki's basket tied the series at 2–2, and Dallas won the next two games for its first title. Two Miami stars were caught mocking his illness with fake coughs.
Q 17Which team won the 2021 NBA Finals after losing the first two games, ending a 50-year title drought?
Milwaukee Bucks
Milwaukee Bucks star Giannis Antetokounmpo scored 50 points in the clinching Game 6, matching the record for a title-deciding game.
Q 18Which coach won six NBA titles with the Chicago Bulls and five more with the Los Angeles Lakers?
Phil Jackson
Phil Jackson's 11 championships as a head coach are an NBA record, and no head coach in the NFL, the NHL or Major League Baseball has reached ten.
Q 19Which center was named NBA Finals MVP three years running from 2000 to 2002, all with Los Angeles?
Shaquille O'Neal
Shaquille O'Neal also won the league MVP and the All-Star Game MVP in 2000, a same-year sweep that only two players had managed before him.
Q 20Which Golden State guard won his first NBA Finals MVP award in 2022, on his fourth championship team?
Stephen Curry
Stephen Curry had been passed over in three earlier title runs. Against Boston he made six three-pointers in a single quarter, a Finals record at the time.
Q 24Which forward won NBA Finals MVP in both 2017 and 2018, his first two seasons with Golden State?
Kevin Durant
Kevin Durant scored 43 points in Game 3 of the 2018 series, sealing it with a long three-pointer almost identical to one he hit a year earlier.
Q 25Which team swept the 1995 NBA Finals as a sixth seed to win its second straight title?
Houston Rockets
Houston Rockets coach Rudy Tomjanovich took the trophy and told the crowd, 'Don't ever underestimate the heart of a champion!' No lower seed had won the title before.
Q 26Which team beat Indiana in Game 7 of the 2025 NBA Finals for its first title since relocating in 2008?
Oklahoma City Thunder
Oklahoma City Thunder gave the state of Oklahoma its first championship in any major professional sport, in the first Finals Game 7 for nine years.
Q 27Which team beat San Antonio in five games in the 2026 NBA Finals for its first title since 1973?
New York Knicks
New York Knicks guard Jalen Brunson scored 45 points in the clincher, equalling the Finals record for a series-ending game on the road.
Q 28Which center predicted "Fo', fo', fo'" before the 1983 playoffs, then won NBA Finals MVP in a sweep?
Moses Malone
Moses Malone was calling three four-game sweeps for Philadelphia. His team lost just once along the way, so fans rewrote the line as "fo', fi', fo'".
Q 29Which Celtics coach lit a victory cigar on the bench and won eight straight NBA titles from 1959 to 1966?
Red Auerbach
Red Auerbach lit up whenever he judged a game already decided. In the 1960s some Boston restaurants posted signs banning cigars for everyone except him.
Q 30Which Celtics forward called his teammates 'sissies' during the 1984 NBA Finals, then was named series MVP?
Larry Bird
Larry Bird made the jibe after a 33-point loss in Game 3. He averaged 27 points and 14 rebounds as Boston beat the Lakers in seven games.