Julius Erving understood the peril he was facing.

Up 3-2 in the ABA finals with Game 6 at home in the Nassau Coliseum, Dr. J and his New York Nets found themselves down 22 to the 60-win Denver Nuggets in the third quarter.

An anxious and at times angry 15,434 fans offered little respite from the pressure.

“You know, we lose [that] game, we’re going back to Denver,” Erving said in a recent phone conversation with Sports+. “And we won one game there all year, and that was the first game of that series. So, we really did not want that to happen. … I mean,  that was just a reality. We dared not think about that.”