The Miami Heat were hurt after a beating in their own arena a game earlier, came to Boston and beat the Celtics 109-103 to regain home-court advantage.
They didn’t even need a full game from Jimmy Butler, who has led the Heat throughout the postseason. This time it was Bam Adebayo, who donned the overalls to get his team ahead on both sides of the ball.
Miami’s lead reached 26 points in the first half of Game 3 on Saturday night and put the Eastern Conference final series 2-1 in their favor to secure at least one more game on their floor.
MIAMI HEAT
1.- Another puts on the hero cape. He scored 31 points, after he entered the game with an average of 8 points in the first two. He had 10 rebounds and 82 touches in Game 3, seven more times than in the first two of the series.
He gave six assists, that is, double what he had added in the games in Miami.
His presence is important if you consider that Butler did not play the second half due to knee inflammation discomfort that he has suffered in these playoffs.
And more importantly the performance of Adebayo, when it is unknown if Butler will be for Game 4.
2.- They steal the night. The Heat forced 24 Celtics turnovers that resulted in 33 points; the most in the entire series for both teams. Instead, Miami only turned nine turnovers, resulting in as many points.
That represents a considerable advantage for the Heat, if you consider, as Coach Spoelstra said, that it is not only the points that the one who recovers the ball scores, but also the ones that the one who lost it stops scoring, in addition to change of momentum and rhythm. of match.
Some 19 of the 24 turnovers came with steals; the most in Heat history.
3.- The early riser… Miami has to start the game quickly and effectively to silence the Boston crowd soon. A big part of the reason they led by up to 26 points in the first half was that they shot 64 percent in the first quarter.
Getting off to a fast start out of the locker room has helped in his two victories, in which he has only won two quarters of the 12 that have been played in the series: The first on Saturday and the third in Game 1.
BOSTON CELTICS
1:45
Sebastián Martínez Christensen with the report of what happened in Game 3 of the duel between Miami and Boston.
1.- Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown forget the ball. Al Horford and Marcus Smart scored 20 and 16 points, respectively. Tatum added 10 more points, but none in the second half, plus he had six turnovers, adding to Jaylen Brown’s seven. So it is difficult to think that they could beat the team that had the best regular season record, even if they were at home.
The Celtics played without center Robert Williams because of a sore left knee. He was replaced by Theis, who scored only 1 point.
2.- The Celtics need help from their bench: Boston’s reserves barely scored 16 points; actually only 13 because the last three were already with the Heat watching motionlessly for the game clock to expire.
Coach Ime Udoka only used three players from the bench in significant game time, including Williams, who scored 10 points in 39 minutes on the court; an eternity. The rest of the substitutes combined for 27 minutes on the pitch.
The Miami bench, on the other hand, scored 23 points in a combined 57 minutes they played.
3.- The Celtics are going to have to take more care of the ball and, above all, play more aggressive and physical at all angles of basketball, but particularly down the board, if they intend to match the series and avoid going into a hole from which it will be very difficult to get out in should the series go back to Miami 1-3.
The Celtics lost the battle in rebounds by 10 (44-34) and even worse in points on second down, also almost double (15-8).
Not that Boston needs another 40 points from Brown either, of course that would be great. But it is more urgent that he avoid the seven turnovers.