The NBA Eastern Conference top seeds Milwaukee Bucks are on the brink of elimination as the Miami Heat won to take a commanding 3-0 lead in Orlando. In the West, LA Lakers lost the opening game to the Houston Rockets in the best-of-7 series.
NBA Results: Miami Heat 115 – 100 Milwaukee Bucks
The Miami Heat have taken a 3-0 lead over the Milwaukee Bucks after defeating the Eastern Conference’s No. 1 seed 115-100 on Friday.
Heat forward Jimmy Butler outscored Milwaukee 17-13 by himself in the fourth quarter. The Heat ended the tie with a whopping 35-9 run, outscoring the Bucks 40-13 in the last 12 minutes of the game as Giannis Antetokounmpo failed to get his offense going in the clutch. No team in NBA history has ever successfully rallied from a 3-0 deficit.
Khris Middleton and Brook Lopez kept the offense flowing for the Milwaukee Bucks. The duo had a combined 29 points in the first half while Giannis Antetokounmpo had only seven. Adebayo had 20 points and 16 rebounds, and Jae Crowder had 17 points to help the Heat improve to 7-0 in this postseason. Brook Lopez scored 22 points for Milwaukee, which got 21 points, 16 rebounds and nine assists.
“I think everybody else in the world might be. But not us here. Not if you wear a Heat jersey, if you’re one of these coaches, if you’re part of this organization, if you’ve been seeing what we’ve been doing all year long, that doesn’t surprise us.”
-JIMMY BUTLER
Miami can close out the series in Game 4 on Sunday and move to the Eastern Conference finals for the first time since 2014.
Houston Rockets 112 – 97 Los Angeles Lakers
The best-of-seven series, began on Friday as the Houston Rockets took a 1-0 lead, beating the LA Lakers, 112-97. The semi-finals matchup included four All-Stars and three career MVPs between James Harden, LeBron James, Russell Westbrook, and Anthony Davis.
3⃣6⃣ PTS for @JHarden13 in the @HoustonRockets Game 1 W! #NBAPlayoffs
Game 2 ⏩ Sun. (9/6) at 8:30pm/et on ABC pic.twitter.com/a2fdubEn2s
— NBA (@NBA) September 5, 2020
Harden led the way for the Rockets scoring 36 points and 5 assists. As a team, the Rockets 35.9% from behind the arc on 39 attempts. The problem is that the Lakers weren’t nearly as successful with their attempts, shooting 28.9% on 38 attempts.
Houston, which actually won the points in the paint battle 42-20 and tied the rebounding battle 41-41.
Congrats to @JHarden13 of the @HoustonRockets for moving up to 7th on the all-time #NBAPlayoffs THREES list! pic.twitter.com/jXbJPC9vSI
— NBA (@NBA) September 5, 2020
Anthony Davis ended the night with 25 points and LeBron James added 20, 8 rebounds and 7 assists on 7-of-15 shooting. The Lakers have struggled in shooting ever since arriving in Orlando.
The Lakers are one of sports’ elite franchises, their 16 championships one behind Boston for most in NBA history. But they are in the second round for the first time since 2012, a month before LeBron James won his first NBA title and Davis was drafted with the No. 1 pick. The Lakers will look to patch things up in defense and try to bounce back on Sunday.
