BOSTON — The scene in the Miami Heat locker room after Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals was no different than any other job site in the latest city the eighth seed unwound from an honest day’s work. Music turned up, Harpoon IPAs all around and appreciation for the dude who carried the heaviest burden.
“We can beat anybody,” several members of the Heat’s basketball operations staff told Yahoo Sports prior to Wednesday’s workmanlike 123-116 win over the second-seeded Celtics. You expect to hear that from a team, especially one that eliminated the Milwaukee Bucks and New York Knicks in the first two rounds of the playoffs, but the matter-of-fact manner in which they said it conveys a belief that funnels from the top through Jimmy Butler, whose 35 points, 7 assists, 6 steals and 5 rebounds marked another heroic effort.
Butler denied the existence of “Playoff Jimmy” after his 56 points swung the Heat’s first-round series over the Bucks, but there’s no denying it now. The 33-year-old has as many 40-point nights in 107 career playoff games as he does in 754 regular-season outings, and his latest performance was as good as any of them.
“Obviously, when you get to the playoffs, the level of competition is a little bit higher, and Jimmy is one of the greatest competitors that I’ve ever met,” Udonis Haslem, whose two-decade Heat tenure has spanned the stays of Shaquille O’Neal, Dwyane Wade and LeBron James in Miami, told Yahoo Sports. “So, when it gets to high levels of competition, I’m taking Jimmy all day, seven days a week and twice on Sunday.”
Game 2 is scheduled in Boston on Friday (8:30 p.m. ET, TNT) before Game 3 in Miami on … Sunday.
Miami trailed by 13 points in the first half and 71-59 a minute into the third quarter, but that was close enough for a team that follows its leader’s steady hand. The Heat never stop coming, and Butler instills the confidence in his teammates that if they can just keep the game close, he will carry them to the finish line.
“He’s a championship player,” veteran Heat forward Kevin Love told Yahoo Sports. “He’s the type of guy who elevates his game and is at his best when his best is needed. Not to say in the regular season he’s not that, because he’s an All-NBA guy, but he just has another X-factor, another level to him that the great ones have. We’re following that. He elevates his game, and he’s a guy we look at to lead us and to take us there.”
Bam Adebayo is no different. The brutish All-Star center, who added 20 points, 8 rebounds and 5 assists, ignited a 13-1 run that evaporated Boston’s lead in two minutes time, and Butler carried the Heat home.
He willed a tip-in and-one between Celtics Marcus Smart and Jaylen Brown to give his team the lead for good midway through the third, 79-78. Butler disrupted a lob to Robert Williams III within seconds, and the resulting transition layup cushioned the lead enough for Max Strus to double it three possessions later. Four times Boston cut into that advantage, and Butler responded at every turn, scoring nine straight points, culminating in a 3-pointer that pushed Miami’s edge to 85-87 inside of two minutes left in the third quarter.
The margin ballooned to 12 by the end of a quarter in which the Heat scored a franchise-record 46 points to Boston’s 25. The Celtics trimmed the deficit to five several times in the fourth, but Butler responded in kind. In five minutes between finding Adebayo for a floater and Caleb Martin for a corner 3-pointer, Butler swiped three steals over a span of seven defensive possessions and drilled two more mid-range jumpers.
Then came the dagger, a 27-footer to beat the shot clock and push the lead to 120-110 with 1:03 left. The bucket gave him five playoff games with multiple 3s after he did that just seven times in the regular season.
Playoff Jimmy. The man transforms from an All-NBA player to an all-time great when it’s time to punch in.
“What we used to do with LeBron, we knew what we needed just to calm the game down and get a good shot, whether it be him or somebody else,” Love, who reached four straight Finals with James in Cleveland, told Yahoo Sports. “Jimmy is so unselfish, too. You can drop it into him, he can play pick and roll, and you know, ‘OK, we’re going to have a good possession, and we’re going to have a chance.’ I think that’s a very similar aspect to both Bron and Jimmy — how they are able to manipulate the game and settle a team.”
The Heat might not make more than 50% of their 31 3-point attempts again, and the Celtics will take more than 29 and make more than 10 on most nights, but Butler will steal your math problems and shove them down your throat. He scratches and claws for every edge, and Miami will follow him over a cliff if need be.
“No matter where we play or who we play, in a 48-minute game, if we just stick around, we’ve got a chance,” Haslem told Yahoo Sports. “We’ve got a hell of a closer, so we know if we’re within striking distance, we’ve got a guy who can get us a bucket, and if he doesn’t, he’s going to make the right play.”
The confidence of these Heat is such that when a reporter asked how they have won three straight road games to open the series in Milwaukee, New York and Boston, Adebayo and Kyle Lowry scoffed in disgust.
“We find ways to win,” Adebayo reluctantly said.
Boston better show up for work in the rest of this series and stay until the end, because Butler will be there. He will finish the job if you don’t do yours with the precision necessary at the highest level, and he’ll happily crack your hometown beer on his way to the next gig, whether the flight leaves for Denver or Los Angeles.
