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In this episode, Santiago and Hal recap Heat going up 3-0 against Celtics, and Nuggets also up 3-0 against Lakers.
Contributors
Santiago Leon – @sleon
Hal Phillips – @mandarinhal
Topics
- Heat goes 3-0 against Celtics
- Nuggets are up 3-0 against Lakers
- Melo retires from basketball
- Man City wins Premier League after Nottingham Forest beats Arsenal 1-0, and beats Chelsea 1-0
- McKennie going back to Juventus
Celtics 102 Heat 128
Gabe Vincent scored a career-high 29 points, Duncan Robinson added 22 and the eighth-seeded Heat rolled past the Celtics 128-102 on Sunday night. Miami leads the series 3-0, with a chance to finish off a stunning sweep on Tuesday night at home in Game 4,
Caleb Martin scored 18, Jimmy Butler finished with 16, Bam Adebayo had 13 and Max Strus added 10 for Miami. Every team in NBA history that has won the first three games of a best-of-seven has ultimately prevailed; the Heat are 8-0 in that situation.
Jayson Tatum scored 14 and Jaylen Brown added 12 for the second-seeded Celtics, who won three times on Miami’s floor on the way to winning last season’s East finals — but simply never had a chance in this one and basically emptied the bench for the fourth quarter.
Boston got within 61-49 when Marcus Smart had a three-point play on the opening possession of the second half. The rest was all Miami, which immediately answered with a 28-7 run to open a 33-point lead at 89-56, which had the building rolling. The lead was so big, and there was so much time left, that the sellout crowd of 20,088 actually was subdued a bit by the time it was over.
“We’ll decompress tomorrow,” Spoelstra said, “but we’ll really get our minds right to finish this thing off.”
NBA teams are 0-149 all-time when trailing a series 3-0.
There have been 16 sweeps in conference finals history, but never two in the same postseason.
Nuggets 119 Lakers 108
Jamal Murray scored 37 points, Jokic added 24 points and eight assists and the Nuggets rolled to a 3-0 lead in the Western Conference finals with a 119-108 victory over Los Angeles on Saturday night.
Kentavious Caldwell-Pope scored 12 of his 17 points in the second half against his former team for the top-seeded Nuggets, who have never been this close to the NBA Finals in 47 years in the league. Denver is making its fifth straight playoff appearance, and the ultimate stage is now just one win away.
Denver blew a 14-point lead in Game 3, but made a decisive 13-0 run in the fourth quarter to snap the Lakers’ nine-game home winning streak since March 26, including seven straight victories since the regular season ended. The Nuggets excelled down the stretch with Murray and Jokic repeatedly running a two-man pick-and-roll game suggested by “Coach Jokic,” according to coach Michael Malone.
Anthony Davis had 28 points and 18 rebounds for the seventh-seeded Lakers, who hadn’t lost three straight games since early February. Los Angeles’ prolonged, desperate surge ever since the trade deadline has finally run out of steam against the powerhouse Nuggets, who have won five consecutive playoff games.
James hit three 3-pointers after starting the series 0 for 13 from distance, and Austin Reaves added 23 points and seven rebounds. But Rui Hachimura was the only other Lakers scorer to crack double figures with 13 points, and they couldn’t counter the Nuggets’ balanced effort down the stretch.
Bruce Brown scored 15 points and hit a key 3-pointer down the stretch for the Nuggets before Jokic all but iced it on a 3-pointer with 3:17 to play.
D’Angelo Russell had another rough game for the Lakers, scoring three points on 1-of-8 shooting in 20 minutes. The Lakers’ biggest addition in their trade deadline transformation has just 21 points in the series.
Melo retires
Carmelo Anthony, the star forward who led Syracuse to an NCAA championship in his lone college season and went on to spend 19 years in the NBA, announced his retirement on Monday.
Anthony, who was not in the NBA this season, retires as the No. 9 scorer in league history.
Only LeBron James, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Karl Malone, Kobe Bryant, Michael Jordan, Dirk Nowitzki, Wilt Chamberlain and Shaquille O’Neal scored more than Anthony — who finishes his career with 28,289 points.
Man City Champs
Manchester City have been crowned Premier League champions for the 2022-23 season as Pep Guardiola’s side completed the three-peat.
This is their fifth Premier League title in the last six seasons and they have now won nine top-flight titles in their history, seven of which have been in the last 12 years.
Pep Guardiola also becomes the first manager in history to win three straight top-flight titles in three countries: Spain, Germany and now England.
Manchester City have also reached the finals of the FA Cup and Champions League and an historic treble is now well and truly on for one of the greatest teams the world has seen.
PREDICTIONS
Nuggets at Lakers
HP: Lakers
Leicester at Newcastle
HP: Newcastle