Bulls vs. Heat: Why NBA Finally Has Its Next Great Rivalry

The Chicago Bulls and Miami Heat have officially become the newest and fiercest rivalry in the NBA.

While the two teams often did battle during Michael Jordan’s reign in the 1990s, it was a mostly one-sided affair in favor of Chicago.

Now, the war has been rekindled.

LeBron James took his talents to South Beach and formed an alliance with Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh. Derrick Rose is leading his tough army from the Windy City.

The first shots were fired during the 2011 postseason, when the teams met in the Eastern Conference finals. Miami prevailed, but would go on to lose to the Dallas Mavericks in the finals.

Following a long offseason and lockout, the league wisely decided to schedule four regular-season matchups between these foes during a compressed 66-game schedule.

Fittingly, the series ended on Thursday night with the Heat winning, bringing the war to a 2-2 draw.

It seems inevitable that the sides will once again meet on the battlefield during the 2012 Eastern Conference finals.

Chicago and Miami are both easily the class of the conference (they will secure the No. 1 and 2 seeds in some order). Barring a major upset, neither should lose a seven-game series leading up to the rematch.

If last night’s game was any indication of how the looming showdown will shake out, it’s certainly going to be a violent, bloody affair.

There were two flagrant fouls, four technicals and an ejection. It was chippier than most playoff games and it came during a time when many squads are coasting to the finish line to get some much-needed rest.

Chicago may have made a smart strategic move that saved it from a killing blow—it opted to keep its injury-riddled floor general, D-Rose, on the sidelines instead of throwing him head first into the melee.

According to Will Leitch’s interview of Rose for GQ, the young star knows he will be seeing plenty of the Heat over these next few years. It simply isn’t worth it for him to risk further injury when they will likely be meeting in a month or so.

"They're a team that we're not going to be able to go around," Rose says. "For us to win, we're going to have to go through them every year."

If there were any doubts that this is the next great rivalry, this should put them to rest.