The Miami Heat don’t try to win so much as they insist upon it. This is a franchise that once boldly leveled a playoff roster to build a world-changing superteam, and also one that later spent lavishly on the promise of a borderline playoff team. What unifies those two approaches is an active resistance to rebuilding, borne out over decades of trades and signings intended—in most every case—to make the Heat more immediately competitive. “Since Pat [Riley]’s been here, I think we’ve always gone into seasons with the approach of being a playoff team,” says Heat senior vice president Andy Elisburg. And in the 25 years that Riley has been a part of the Heat organization as a coach and executive, only one other franchise has made more appearances in the NBA Finals. That lone team—the Lakers—now stands just one win away from taking the title for themselves.

From this point on, Miami will play every game with its entire, improbable season on the line. But whatever happens next is possible only because the Heat so painstakingly improved their team, bit by bit, to the point they could make it to the Finals in the first place. Organizational insistence led to the Heat trading two first-round picks (one of which was completely unprotected, due six years down the line) for Goran Dragic in 2015. Dwyane Wade welcomed Dragic to “a team and organization that doesn’t accept losing,” and the franchise, in all its postseason credibility, promised its new point guard he would soon be competing for championships. That same drive led Jimmy Butler to commit to the Heat before Riley and Erik Spoelstra even began their pitch. That drive brought Miami to accurately size up the Eastern Conference as a wide-open field, and to proceed undaunted even as the Bucks blew the doors off the regular season. It gave purpose to a team projected to be a middle playoff seed, and the basis for what would become one of the most impactful trade deadline deals in NBA history.

[Read Rob Mahoney's piece detailing Miami's crucial midseason trade that changed everything.]