Tyler Herro had 24 points and 14 assists, hitting six of Miami’s franchise playoff-record 23 3-pointers, to lead the Heat to a 111-101 victory over the Boston Celtics on Wednesday night and tie their first-round playoff series at one game apiece.
Bam Adebayo had 21 points and 10 rebounds, and new Celtics’ nemesis Caleb Martin also had 21 points for the Heat, who shot 53.5% (23 of 43) from beyond the arc to bounce back after a Game 1 blowout. That broke Miami’s playoff record of 20 3-pointers, set against the Bucks in the 2021 first round.
Jaylen Brown scored 33 points for top-seeded Boston. Jayson Tatum scored 28, showing no ill-effects of Martin’s hard foul that sent him crashing to the floor with under a minute to play in Boston’s 114-94 victory on Sunday.
The series moves to Miami for Games 3 and 4 on Saturday and Monday.
The Celtics won 64 games in the regular season to claim home-court advantage through the NBA Finals, but they didn’t make very good use of it on Wednesday despite a crowd that was still fired up over seeing their star land hard in the series opener.
Tatum had his first career playoff triple-double on Sunday, scoring 23 points with 10 rebounds and 10 assists in a game in which Boston led by as many as 34 points in the fourth quarter. But the big question was how he would bounce back after getting undercut by Martin while going after a rebound.
Tatum started Game 2 and had 14 points in the first quarter. And Martin was heartily booed every time he touched the ball. It only seemed to energize him and the Heat, who needed to win a play-in game to earn the right to face the Celtics.
Miami led by five, 55-50, with two minutes left in the first half before the Brown hit three straight 3-pointers to open a four-point lead. Brown missed a 3 the next time down, but his layup in the final seconds made it 61-58 at the half.
Miami went on a 10-0 run to take an 82-70 lead with under four minutes to play in the third. Boston cut it to six, 102-96, with three minutes left, but Martin hit a 3 and the Celtics never got within two possessions again.
Reporting by The Associated Press.
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