PLAYOFF SERIES: NBA finals; Mavericks lead 2-1.
The Miami Heat have admitted to playing poorly for almost all of the NBA finals. It was their performance over the span of half a quarter, however, that has them right back in the series.
Miami looks to build off its furious comeback at the end of Game 3 and tie the NBA finals at two games apiece as it hosts the Dallas Mavericks.
The Heat were outplayed in the first two games of this series in Dallas, losing both contests by a combined 24 points, and found themselves on the verge of going down 3-0 when they trailed the Mavs 89-76 with just under seven minutes to go in the fourth quarter on Tuesday.
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But behind Dwayne Wade, the Heat mounted the second-largest fourth-quarter rally in NBA finals history, outscoring the Mavs 22-7 over the final 6:34 to come away with a 98-96 win.
"I said, 'I ain't going out like this,"' Wade told his teammates.
Wade tied a career playoff-high with 42 points, with 15 coming in the final quarter -- 12 during the game-ending spurt.
"As a team, we just came out and said this could be the season if they win this game," Wade said. "We came out, ran our offense to the crisp, locked down on defense and came back and won this game."
Wade was hurt with 10:41 left in the third quarter when Shaquille O'Neal fell backward into his left knee. Wade didn't practice Wednesday, but said he would play when the series resumes Thursday.
"Going to bed at night and waking up, it's very stiff and very sore," he said. "The only thing I can continue to do is what I'm ordered to do, and that's a lot of icing. I'm confident in my training staff that they will get me as close as I can be to 100 percent by tomorrow night. So you know, I'm hoping."
Dallas had chances late Tuesday, but Dirk Nowitzki blew an opportunity to tie the game when he missed one of two free throws with 3.4 seconds to go, and Wade knocked away his inbounds pass in the final second on an attempted alley-oop to Josh Howard.
Nowitzki, who finished with 30 points, was 25-of-27 from the line in the series, but could only make the first foul shot.
"We couldn't really get anything down the stretch on both ends of the floor," Nowitzki said. "We started to relax too early or celebrate. We didn't defend them like we did before and we couldn't get anything to drop.
"The only good thing is we're still up 2-1. ... Now we've got a series."
O'Neal had his best game of the finals for Miami with 16 points and 11 rebounds. He also hit two clutch free throws during the epic comeback to pull the Heat within 93-90, and went 4-for-6 from the line after going 2-for-16 in the first two games in Dallas.
"We had 2 1/2 horrible games and now we can use this momentum and pick it up and just try to win four," said O'Neal, who had a playoff career-low five points in Game 2. "We still made a lot of silly mistakes. But, you know, we never gave up. We just kept playing, showed a lot of heart, a lot of intensity.
"We needed this one. Bad."
Dallas' meltdown contributed to its first loss in 26 games this season when Howard scored 20 points, and the Mavs had also won their previous 11 contests when center Erick Dampier reached double figures. Howard had 21, but didn't score over the final 14:42, while Dampier had 12 points and nine rebounds off the bench.
"We didn't expect it to be easy, but we do feel we gave this game away," said Dallas' Jerry Stackhouse, who was held to four points on 1-of-9 shooting Tuesday. "We should've won this game, that's how we feel. We'll talk about being disappointed, but I don't think we'll be despondent.
"They've played their best ball. Maybe they feel they can play better, but we feel like we took a huge punch and only lost by two."
Miami forward Udonis Haslem had a big Game 3 despite playing with a bruised left shoulder suffered in the second contest of the series. Haslem had eight points and 11 rebounds, including eight offensive, and made two huge free throws after stealing the ball and getting fouled to put the Heat ahead 94-93 with 1:03 remaining.
Haslem said his shoulder feels sore when he raises up to shoot or follow through, but Miami's comeback helped ease the pain.
"We needed this one, and were fortunate enough to get it. Now, we'll just move on to the next game. We can't get too high on our horse after winning just one game."
Game 5 is Sunday in Miami.
HOW THEY GOT HERE: Mavericks - 4th seed, Western Conference; beat Memphis Grizzlies 4-0, first round; beat San Antonio Spurs 4-3, semifinals; beat Phoenix Suns 4-2, finals. Heat - 2nd seed, Eastern Conference; beat Chicago Bulls 4-2, first round; beat New Jersey Nets 4-1, semifinals; beat Detroit Pistons 4-2, finals.
PROBABLE STARTERS: Mavericks - F Howard, F Nowitzki, C DeSagana Diop, G Adrian Griffin, G Jason Terry. Heat - F Antoine Walker, F Haslem, C O'Neal, G Jason Williams, G Wade.
PLAYOFF TEAM LEADERS: Mavericks - Nowitzki, 27.8 ppg and 11.8 rpg; Terry, 4.1 apg. Heat - Wade, 27.0 ppg and 6.0 apg; O'Neal, 9.4 rpg.
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Originally Posted by b-diddy
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