If my dad were still with us, I’d have spent the final minute or so of Game 6 on the phone with him. Deadline would’ve needed to wait.

I’d want to hear his reaction as the final seconds ticked away, as Stephen Curry threw the ball into the air and the Warriors officially became champions.

Many Warriors fans didn’t think they would see this day. My father didn’t.

He died two days after the Warriors wrapped up the embarrassing 2000-01 season with their 13th straight loss. They finished 17-65 that year, and one of our last conversations was about how Vonteego Cummings had to go and maybe Antawn Jamison was salvageable.

What the Warriors accomplished Tuesday seemed impossible back then. We didn’t plot how to win a championship. We just wanted them to stop blowing games in the fourth quarter.

These Warriors are so far from that. They handle business down the stretch. They rise to challenges. They are marked by toughness and resilience.

They didn’t choke against the undermanned Cavaliers. They closed their third series of these playoffs on the road. They got better as the pressure mounted. They made the nerves and doubt inherent in Warriors fans look foolish in hindsight.

These aren’t my father’s Warriors. But I wish they could’ve been.

I would’ve given just about anything to share that moment with him. To point my cell phone to the crowd of Dubs fans screaming “Waaaaaarrrriooooors” in Cleveland’s arena. To have him interrupt our conversation so he could, finally, gloat to the Lakers fans he surely would’ve had over to the house. To hear him lay his favorite compliment on NBA Finals MVP Andre Iguodala: “That boy cooold.”

Thinking about my father crystallizes for me just how unlikely this all was at one point. Being too far in the forest, following this title run in earnest since about March, thinking about him helps me see the trees. While the Warriors winning the 2015 championship felt like it should’ve happened, from an analytical standpoint, it’s crazy to think it did.

They actually didn’t disappoint. They eliminated the need for excuses.

The Warriors my dad knew were the ones who always were a player or three away from really contending. The ones who always had the derailing injuries. The ones who always had a reason for losing.

That was his existence as a Warriors fan, as it was for many in the Bay Area.

Like most fathers and sons, sports was a bond for us. He wasn’t exactly a die-hard Warriors fan. We didn’t go to games; we couldn’t afford such luxuries. Other issues always kept sports from being so important in our family. But it was something we would talk about, and the Warriors were the team in which he was most interested.

I’d try to impress him by popping off stats. We’d talk about fixing the Warriors. Long before analytics and online trade machines, we’d diagnose the roster and play general manager.

We’d watch games together, and he’d usually fall asleep on the couch. I’d turn off the television when the game was over. That was back in the days before remote, when you had to get up and shut off the TV by hand, and sometimes the pop would wake him.

“Leave the TV alone. I’m watching the game,” he’d snap, his Afro flattened on one side and his eyes half open.

“Daddy, the game is over. Warriors lost,” is how I’d usually respond. My groggy pops would then ask me a ton of questions about what happened.

My dad was 18 the last time the Warriors won a championship. I don’t think he was passionate about basketball during his years at Castlemont High School. Most things took a back seat to singing, dancing, dressing and chasing girls. But I know he latched on to Gus Williams, who was a rookie on the 1975-76 Warriors. Whenever we went one-on-one, mostly at nearby Sobrante Park Elementary, he’d shout “Gus” when he pulled up for a jumper, his fingernails scratching the ball in his quest for that perfect rotation.

I’d have no idea about Gus Williams’ game if not for ESPN Classic. But seeing the footage of the 1979 NBA Finals, when Williams played for Seattle, it made sense. My dad loved the herky-jerky, stop-and-go drives, mixed in with random spin moves and sudden pull-ups.

My dad would have loved Stephen Curry. Curry is Gus Williams struck by lightning. The handle. The shot. The wizardry. Curry would’ve had my dad screaming at the television, as he did often for Tim Hardaway (and Magic Johnson on the low).

“That boy cooold!”

My dad most certainly would’ve called me — as if I weren’t on deadline — during the fourth quarter of Game 5, when Curry took it to the playground, mesmerizing defenders with his dribble before dropping in step-back 3s.

Looking back, my dad always favored the little playmakers. Sleepy Floyd. Keith “Mister” Jennings. Hardaway.

You know who else my dad would’ve liked? Draymond Green. If I had a dollar for every time I heard, “Larry Smith the only one playing hard” or “At least Chris Gatling ain’t afraid.”

There was a lot to like about this Warriors team. So much good going on it made hardened journalists sound like hype men. My dad would’ve liked their camaraderie, their hustle, their flashiness.

These Warriors were so unlike every other edition we followed over the years. So much more talented. So much more ready.

These weren’t my father’s Warriors. I wish they could’ve been.

Read Marcus Thompson II’s blog at blogs.mercurynews.com/thompson. Follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/ThompsonScribe.