-
Andrew Lopez, ESPN
MIAMI — In the locker room following a Game 4 win, Miami Heat veteran forward Kevin Love told reporters that when the game is close, the Heat know who to go to — Jimmy Butler and Bam Adebayo. On Friday night in Game 6, it was those two players who carried the Heat to the Eastern Conference Finals for the second consecutive season.
Butler had 24 points and eight rebounds while Adebayo had 23 points and nine boards as the Heat defeated the New York Knicks, 96-92, to win the series 4-2.
Butler knocked down a pair of free throws with 14.4 seconds remaining to help ice the game as the Heat thwarted off any attempt of a Knicks comeback.
With the win, the Heat became just the second No. 8 seed in NBA history to reach the conference finals. The only other team to accomplish this was the 1998-99 Knicks, who eventually made it to the NBA Finals that season.
For the Knicks, the loss means they still haven’t reached a conference finals since 2000. The only other teams in the NBA with longer streaks of not reaching the conference finals are the Washington Wizards (1979) and the Charlotte Hornets (never).
This is the seventh conference finals appearance for the Heat under Erik Spoelstra who took over the team in 2008-09.
New York jumped out to a 31-17 lead but the Heat held the Knicks scoreless over the final 2:40 of the first quarter to cut that lead in half heading into the second. After the Knicks started the second quarter with a 3-pointer by Jalen Brunson, answered with a 13-2 to take the lead on a Bam Adebayo dunk at the 7:48 mark, drawing a timeout from Tom Thibodeau and ending Brunson’s brief time on the bench.
Miami led 51-50 at halftime and never trailed in the second half. They held the Knicks to just 5x points after the first quarter.
When the Heat defeated the Milwaukee Bucks in Game 5 to win their first-round series, they trailed by as many as 16. This makes Miami just the second team in the last 25 years to clinch multiple series in a single postseason with a comeback of 14+ in the deciding game joining the 2019 Portland Trail Blazers, according to ESPN Stats and Information.