In basketball, this describes a playoff series victory achieved by winning four games to one. It signifies a decisive win, but with the losing team managing to secure a single victory to avoid a complete shutout. An example of this would be a team winning games 1, 2, 3, and 5 of a best-of-seven series, allowing their opponent to win game 4.
This outcome carries a certain symbolic weight, suggesting that the victorious team was clearly superior, yet the losing team was capable of some level of competitiveness. Historically, these series results are noted as demonstrations of dominance with a degree of resilience from the vanquished. It is often viewed as a relatively quick series result compared to a drawn out 7-game series.