Miami ? Erick Dampier remembers how frustrating the 2006 NBA Finals were for the Dallas Mavericks.

It wasn’t just losing four straight that drove the Mavericks (and ref-baiting owner Mark Cuban) to the brink of insanity.

It was the way Dwyane Wade lived on the foul line in those final four games.

Hard fouls. Touch fouls. Blocking fouls. Continuations.

If every whistle didn’t favor Wade, it sure seemed that way.

Conspiracy theorists lit up the Internet almost as rapidly as young Flash made the scoreboard spin.

“That was a big series for him,” Dampier, now a Heat backup center, says of his tormentor-turned-teammate. “He did whatever it took for them to win. Hopefully he does the same thing this year and we’re able to get that championship.”

The Hollywood Heat (to borrow Joakim Noah’s phrase) would gladly take a repeat performance after watching Wade shoot 58-for-73 (.794) from the line in the final four games of the ’06 Finals.

Take out Game 4, when Wade shot just nine free throws, and the Heat slasher nearly matched the Mavs in attempts (74-64) in Games 3, 5 and 6.

And here’s some more bad news for Cuban and Co. in advance of Tuesday’s opener: It’s not just Wade this time.

With LeBron James and Wade now swapping forays through the lane, the Heat has been nearly as dominant at the foul line (both directions) in this postseason.

“We’re an aggressive team,” Wade said Sunday. “We are a team that attacks and puts pressure on the defense and makes them make decisions. A lot of times we have great finishers going to the basket.”

Through three rounds and 15 games, the Heat have made 349 free throws. That’s 46 more than their opponents have attempted.

“That’s the DNA of our team,” Wade said, “and that results in free throws, obviously, at times.”

At times?

The Heat have outscored their playoff opponents by 121 points at the line (8.1 per game) while taking 133 more attempts. The Heat have shot 80 percent compared with 75 percent for their foes.

“We know the rules,” James said. “We play the rules. We’re not a foul-prone team.”

Not only do Heat players not foul out, they rarely even get into serious foul trouble.

Just twice in the past two rounds — and five times throughout the playoffs — has a Heat player reached five fouls.

Noah (Game 4) and Elton Brand (Game 5) have fouled out, while nine more Heat opponents have drawn a fifth personal.

How do the Heat manage to play such “aggressive, physical” defense — to use coach Erik Spoelstra’s description — without fouling?

“You’ve got to keep your hands off people,” James said. “We play physical defense, but we try to keep our hands off bodies and just try to help one another. When a guy is beat, we come across and we play by the rules.”

This ability/disparity takes on even greater meaning as the Heat prepare to defend Dirk Nowitzki, who isn’t just leading all playoff participants in free-throw attempts (140) but is making 93 percent of them.

Remember Nowitzki’s 48-point outburst against Oklahoma City in the opener of the Western Conference finals? Half of those points came on the foul line, where Nowitzki didn’t miss.

“You have to find a way to keep your hands off guys like Dirk and Jason Terry (89 percent) and their whole team,” James said. “They shoot the ball extremely well from the free-throw line.”

Of course, as the ’06 Mavericks can tell you, that only matters if you get there.

Which brings us back to Dampier. Certainly, now that he’s switched sides, the veteran center believes all those pro-Wade whistles were legitimate, right?

“I’m not going to answer that one,” Dampier said.

Some wounds are just too deep.