Heat survive Rondo’s huge night, win in OT
Miami — LeBron James scored 34 points and grabbed 10 rebounds as the Miami Heat pulled off the biggest playoff comeback in the club’s history to beat the Boston Celtics 115-111 in overtime on Wednesday night.
Dwayne Wade scored 23 points and Mario Chalmers scored 22 for the Heat, who took a 2-0 lead in the Eastern Conference finals despite an unbelievable night by Rajon Rondo. The Celtics guard played all 53 minutes and scored 44 points, dished out 10 assists and grabbed eight rebounds.
“This group had resolve,” Wade said of the Celtics. “They came out and played a great game. It was physical early. They brought the game to us. That can’t happen. We used our crowd and the energy to get back into the game and we had to play better.”
Paul Pierce scored 21 points, Kevin Garnett added 18 and Ray Allen 13 for Boston.
Rondo finished 16 of 24 from the floor, 10 of 12 from the foul line and made both his 3-point tries.
“He was absolutely phenomenal,” Celtics coach Doc Rivers said. “Put us, put the whole team at times on his shoulders. … We had a lot of opportunities to win the game.”
Allen’s 3-pointer with 34.3 seconds left tied the game at 99-all. James missed two shots, first a layup — he got the rebound of his own miss — and then a jumper on the final possession of regulation, and to overtime they went.
“We had to do it the tough way,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said.
Game 3 is Friday in Boston.
The Heat had come back to win from 14 points down in playoff games twice before, first in Game 6 of the 2006 NBA finals — their title clincher — and again last season against Philadelphia.
And this one was slipping away, more than once. James missed two free throws 21 seconds into overtime, and Miami looked in trouble. But the Heat held on, in a game where they took 47 free throws — 24 by James — to Boston’s 29.
The scoring dossier in overtime began like this: Rondo scored, Heat tied it, Rondo scored, Heat tied it, Rondo scored, Heat tied it.
When Rondo missed a layup — he thought he was fouled, and the Celtics agreed — with 1:33 left, Miami took advantage, with Udonis Haslem getting a dunk to put the Heat up 105-103. /ap
