LeBron James was not letting Kevin Garnett and the Boston Celtics get in the way of ending the Heat's season on Thursday night.
The Boston Celtics went into Game 6 with all the momentum and an opportunity to close out the Miami Heat in the Eastern Conference finals. LeBron James snatched all of the Celtics’ hopes with an otherworldly performance in leading the Heat to a 98-79 victory.
James has been hurting the Celtics all series with his scoring, but the Heat has not been able to keep the Celtics from upending his play. On Thursday night, James and his teammates were able to gain an early advantage (26-16 after the 1st quarter) and the Celtics could not get a sustained run to cut into the Heat advantage.
James scored 45 points on 19-of-26 from the field, 15 rebounds, and 5 assists. He was knocking down contested jumpers while Paul Pierce and Mickael Pietrus missed open three-pointers. Kevin Garnett missed an uncontested layup in an effort to get the Celtics within 10 points at the end of the third quarter.
The Celtics finished with just 14 assists as a team and they threw up the white flag with a little over seven minutes left in the game.
The final game will be played on Saturday night. The Celtics need to defend James better by making it tougher for the Heat to throw entry passes and limit his drives towards the basket. Another fear is the Heat role players did not show up in Game 5. Mario Chalmers and Shane Battier hit some shots early in the contest in Game 6, but it was basically all about give the ball to LeBron James and get out of his way. Players like Chalmers, Battier, and Udonis Haslem could make big plays tonight, especially with their home crowd behind them.
The entire Celtics team needs to show up offensively. Rajon Rondo kept the team reasonably close in the first half with his penetration to the basket in Game 6, but he also committed too many turnovers and made some bad decisions such as an entry pass to Garnett inside where the Heat had Garnett bottled up with multiple defenders. Pierce shot just 4-of-18 from the field with 9 points and was relegated to the bench early in the second quarter in foul trouble. The bench provided just 2 points until Doc Rivers emptied the bench in garbage time.
Throughout the 2011-’12 season, the Celtics have never made anything easy. Game 7 does not get any easier having to beat the Heat in Miami to make their third NBA Finals in five years.