After uncharacteristically missing a potential tying free throw at the end of Game Three of the NBA Finals, Dirk Nowitzki admitted he had trouble sleeping when he got back to his hotel room.

Part of it was Nowitzki's nature. He is his own worst critic and expects excellence from himself, especially at the free-throw line, where he has been virtually automatic during
the post-season. Prior to his miss, Nowitzki had made 26-of-28 free throws in the Finals.

"Tossing and turning and playing things over in your head, what you could have done different," he said. "Usually I approach every free throw the same and maybe I was overconfident. The first one felt so great and it went right through that maybe I was relaxing a little bit. I don't know.

"Then I kind of short-armed it and hit kind of the front of the rim and rolled out. It was definitely a tough one to swallow. Hopefully, I'll be in this position again and make it up."

And the other element that kept Nowitzki up late?

"It didn't help that the room service took about three hours because they were a little overwhelmed," he said.

Nowitzki may be the best seven-foot foul shooter in NBA history. He has career marks of 86% in the regular season and 88% in the play-offs.

During the 2006 post-season, Nowitzki has made 182 of 203 free throws, just a shade under 90%. In Game Seven of the Western Conference semi-finals, he made 15 of 16 foul shots,
including one that forced overtime with 21 seconds to go. In Game Five of the conference finals, he was 17 of 18.

It's one of the reasons Germany will be playing at the FIBA World Championship in Japan come August.

He made 54 of 61 (88.5%) of his free throws at last year's EuroBasket when Germany captured a silver medal to book their place for Japan.

Nowitzki's coach and team-mates cannot wait for their superstar to get a chance to redeem himself.

"We'll take Dirk in that situation a hundred times," Mavericks coach Avery Johnson said. "I don't even blink in that situation. ... We still love him. I'm not going to take away any of his per diem or anything like that."

"It was a surprising thing, but nobody is perfect in this league," Howard said. "You're going to miss free throws and you're going to miss shots. I think that's going to motivate him for next game. I'm looking for big things out of him."

Article courtesy of www.fiba.com