NBA Finals: Dubs delirium seizes Oakland

Will Cristobal holds his son Liam Cristobal, 2, as they cheer with the crowd in the first quarter during an NBA Finals Game 6 Warriors Watch Party at Oracle Arena in Oakland, CA Tuesday, June 16, 2015. Will Cristobal holds his son Liam Cristobal, 2, as they cheer with the crowd in the first quarter during an NBA Finals Game 6 Warriors Watch Party at Oracle Arena in Oakland, CA Tuesday, June 16, 2015. Photo: Michael Short, Special To The Chronicle Buy photo Photo: Michael Short, Special To The Chronicle Image 1 of / 150 Caption Close NBA Finals: Dubs delirium seizes Oakland 1 / 150 Back to Gallery

From the jam-packed Oracle Arena to the streets and bars of downtown, Oakland exploded into shouting, fist-pumping joy Tuesday as the Golden State Warriors beat the Cleveland Cavaliers to win their first NBA title in 40 long-suffering years.

Hundreds spilled out of doorways along Broadway to dance in the streets and hug each other, and all along the core avenues of the city center, fans honked their horns ceaselessly and screamed “Warriors! Warriors! Warriors!” to the skies and to each other. Some pounded on light poles and pans; others just closed their eyes and yelled.

At the always-noisy Oracle Arena, a sold-out crowd at $15 a ticket screamed its lungs hoarse while the team methodically ground down the Cavaliers on wide screens with images streamed in live from Cleveland. There were a few nail-biting moments here and there, including a Cavaliers surge at the end, but the team had a sense of momentum that translated to the wildly hopeful fans in the stands.

“This is amazing,” 18-year old San Rafael resident Parth Desai said as the crowd exulted all around him among the seats. “The bay has been waiting a long time for this. My whole childhood was them suffering.”

“I knew it from the beginning of the season. It was destined,” said his friend Jeremy Retornaz, 18, also of San Rafael. “The whole team comes out to play. Everyone is committed.”

Throughout the evening, the arena felt more like a high-energy home game than a watch party. The frenzied crowd booed whenever the Cavaliers shot free throws, and whipped into a deafening roar at every Warriors bucket. When victory finally hit, fireworks shot from the arena’s roof and — if possible — even more ferocious aural bedlam erupted inside.

The celebration soon spilled outside, where the delirious throngs laughed and danced to music pounding out of speakers well into the night in the parking lot and walkways.

At the Heart and Dagger Saloon, a watering hole across the street from Lake Merritt, an exuberant crowd squeezed itself in while bartenders did their best to keep the Warriors faithful hydrated.

Some tension hung in the air, alongside the aroma of pizza and buffalo wings, as the Cavaliers made a run to bring the game within two at halftime — and things remained tense as Cleveland got within striking distance toward the end of the fourth quarter. Fans screamed unprintable things at the wall-mounted television, trying to will LeBron James and his teammates into submission from thousands of miles away.

But as the Warriors built what would prove to be an insurmountable lead, the taunts turned to cheers.

And then the Dubs were champions.

“I just — I can’t — I just don’t know,” said Dan Turner, a 23-year-old Oakland native and lifelong Warriors fan. “To have been a fan for all those years when they were bad and now this? I’m shaking. I’m just ecstatic.”

The ebullience was echoed all across the Bay Area, where fans took in the game in living rooms, restaurants and watering holes. In San Francisco — where the team is building a new arena — fans partied at bars and zipped through the downtown streets, screaming and honking.

Happy shouts filtered out from houses from one end of the city to the other, and crowds ran into the streets of the Mission District to dance, pound on drums and set off firecrackers. Revelers packed Mission Street around 24th Street so full they shut down traffic while police looked warily on — and then around midnight, officers had to sweep in to quell a bottle-tossing contingent. Two people were arrested.

The Warriors went into the evening leading the best-of-seven series 3 games to 2, raising expectations that this would indeed be the day that brought an NBA title to the Bay Area for the first time since 1975. Beneath the elation, however, was a weary caution among those who know all too well that fan exuberance after championships over the years has often devolved into late-night violence, fueled by boozy idiocy.

“This is a cautiously optimistic look at the conclusion of the NBA finals,” said Ali Silmi, who boarded up the front windows of his Metro PCS shop on the corner of Broadway and Ninth Street in downtown Oakland. He’s hauled out the wood several times over the years when his store was smashed and looted during various Oakland protests — and the flames and vandalism that followed the San Francisco Giants baseball championships across the bay are all the warning he needs to be careful this time too.

Even as he prepared for the worst, Silmi showed his civic pride. His large sheets of particleboard were decorated with the heads of Warriors stars Steph Curry, Andre Iguodala, Draymond Green, Andrew Bogut and Klay Thompson. Within blocks of his shop, City Hall and Lake Merritt were lit up in team colors of blue and gold.

“We always have to board up for negativity,” Silmi said. “It’s nice to board up for positivity.”

His fears remained unfounded deep into the evening as the biggest action took place several blocks away around 18th Street along Broadway and Telegraph Avenue. There, hundreds of people partied in the middle of the streets for hours, some leaping off light poles into the crowds, some lighting up firecrackers, others slapping high-fives with police who stood nearby in case trouble erupted.

One grinning fan waved a sign reading, “If you want to riot go to San Francisco.” The flip side of the sign read, “Oakland has the best basketball and the best booty.”

Video: Golden State Warriors fans celebrate in Oakland

Up and down International Boulevard, from First Avenue by the lake to 101st Avenue in deep East Oakland, horns blared, fireworks boomed and the smell of burned rubber hung in the air as ecstatic fans spun their tires in celebratory donuts. Overexcited fans crashed two cars on International around 50th Avenue and left them smoking alongside the road.

Crowds of fans stood on corners waving Warriors flags and dancing in the street around 98th Avenue far into the evening. A large contingent of police staged nearby and moved in at times to disperse groups when they started to get unruly.

Celebrations in Oakland and San Francisco appeared to have petered out by about 1 a.m.

Over at Massive barbershop at Seventh and Washington streets, if the scissors weren’t busy in someone’s hair, you could swear they were cutting the excitement in the air all afternoon and evening.

Owner Napoleon Wommack hails from the Midwest, but that’s so yesterday. He is a Warriors man now.

“This is the town I live in,” he said. “Plus my daughter and wife are both Warriors fans. I have no choice.”

Chronicle staff writer Vivian Ho contributed to this report.

Evan Sernoffsky, Kevin Fagan, Kale Williams and Rachel Swan are San Francisco Chronicle staff writers. E-mail: esernoffsky@sfchronicle.com, kfagan@sfchronicle.com, kwilliams@sfchronicle.com and rswan@sfchronicle.com

Parade Friday

The Warriors and the city of Oakland plan a victory rally and parade in Oakland on Friday at 10 a.m. in celebration of the team’s NBA championship, according to team officials.

The parade will begin on Broadway at 11th Street, turn right on Grand Avenue and right on Harrison Street to Lakeside Drive, end on Oak Street, and proceed to the Henry J. Kaiser Convention Center. Fans can begin to line up for the rally as early as 5 a.m. at Lakeshore Avenue and 12th Street, according to the team. BART will run extra trains for the event, and AC Transit will redirect some buses to accommodate the crowds.

For more information, go to warriors.com/parade.