Paul Pierce has recalled a story about Kevin Garnett employing some hilarious Micheal Jordan-like tactics against Mavs star Dirk Nowitzki.
Pierce says that during a Celtics-Mavs game Garnett resorted to accusing Nowitzki of using a racial slur as a tactic to try and throw him off his game.
“We playing the Dallas Mavericks right, we got KG and Dirk Nowitzki playing and Dirk is on one right now,” said Pierce. “KG’s guarding him and I mean he’s killing KG and I’m like ‘damn.’ So I’m on the wing in the corner and KG’s guarding him at the elbow. Something happened and KG fouled him. And he got in Dirk’s face and said ‘You heard that?’ He said ‘He called me a n*gga.’ I said ‘Ticket I was right there he didn’t call you no n*gga. He said ‘Yes he did he said it in German.’
In 40 career games against each other, Nowitzki had a slight edge over Garnett, since he notched 20 wins to Garnett’s 17.
Despite their rivalries, the pair only ended up facing off in one playoff series in their careers.
It was the 2002 playoffs, and Dirk’s Dallas team swept KG’s Minnesota team.
Nowitzki averaged 33.3 points per game in the series.
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