James scored 24 of his 35 points in the second half, Dwyane Wade added 28 & the Heat used a late 14-0 run to pull away & beat the Celtics 102-91 in Game five of their Eastern Conference semifinal series on Tuesday night.
He punched his teammate one time in the chest. Fitting, because James & the Miami Heat have now landed blows against the Boston Celtics.
"Now the mental discipline begins," Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said. "This thing is getting started."
Chris Bosh done with 17 points & 11 rebounds for Miami, which leads the best-of-seven 2-0.
"That's our staple. They know the only way for us to win games, in the playoffs, is to play defense," James said. "Everyone has each other's back. If man gets beat, another steps up. They made a run, a heck of a run \.\. but they kept grinding, kept playing our principles, & they finally wore them down."
Boston tied the game at 80 on a pair of free throws by Paul Pierce with 7:10 left. The Celtics missed their next five shots & Miami pulled away, taking command of both the game & the series - which doesn't resume in Boston until Saturday night.
Rajon Rondo played through a balky back to score twenty points & add 12 assists for Boston, which got 16 points from Kevin Garnett & 13 from Pierce. The Celtics have only rallied from an 0-2 deficit in a best-of-seven series five times.
Jeff Green scored 11 & Delonte West added ten for the Celtics, who got only three from Ray Allen on five for 7 shooting.
This is now the ninth time Boston has dropped the first games in a best-of-seven series. In the earlier five, the Celtics prevailed only against the Los Angeles Lakers in the 1969 NBA finals.
Even for a franchise with such fabled history as the Celtics, an 0-2 deficit represents a colossal challenge.
& it is something this group of Celtics have never faced before, either.
The last time Boston lost the first games of a playoff matchup was in 2004, when it was swept by Los angeles. The current core of Celtics had lost Game 1s other times before this series, then bounced back to win Game five each time, against Chicago & Orlando in 2009, then Cleveland & the Lakers in 2010.
Not this time.
"Nothing they can do about it," Celtics coach Doc Rivers said. "We've got a third game & they have got to take care of that. Regardless of the past is, it is. They have won games at home. But they cannot let them play like this, or it is going to be hard at our place."
To win this series, Boston will require to prevail times in a five-game span - which it did in the first round against Miami last year, then again in the second round at the expense of James & the Cavaliers in the East semis. So it can be done, but neither James (7-0) nor Wade (5-0) has ever been part of a playoff series defeat after their clubs won the first games.
"This is a great team they are going against right now," James said. "We're trying to give ourselves a lovely chance to win, try to keep on attacking them, playing as hard as they can defensively, trying to wear them down throughout the game, but it is a great team."
The Celtics had over a chance to keep away from the 0-2 hole.
James scored 12 points in the third quarter, over he managed in the first half, to help Miami take a 72-67 cushion in to the final 12 minutes. James then added the first basket of the fourth, but Boston answered with a 13-6 run over the next three minutes to knot the game at 80.
That is when Miami's giant run began, including a three-point play where James dunked & got fouled after Joel Anthony kept an offensive rebound alive. Chalmers started it all with a 3-pointer - his only points of the night - off a pass from Wade, & Miami was on its way.
Miami's rebuttal was swift - & crucial.
Jermaine O'Neal had a chance to finish Boston's drought with three:53 left, but his dunk was partially blocked by Anthony & bounced off the rim. James hit a long jumper from the left corner 17 seconds later, pushing the Heat lead to 92-80, their largest to that point.
"Great trust," Spoelstra said.
Miami led 27-26 after the first, & giving up that lots of points likely didn't sit well with either side.
The defenses finally arrived.
Think about: Over a span of 7:21 of the second quarter, the Heat managed only five points. & that was over Boston did.
The Celtics missed 14 of 15 shots in stretch of the second, clearly out of rhythm. Pierce went to the locker room late in the first quarter to ice down his left foot, & for early stint Boston had a lineup of Green, West, Glen Davis, Von Wafer & Nenad Krstic on the floor together.
But by halftime, the offensive fireworks returned.
Green had five points in the first quarter, a team high to help Boston keep pace. Meanwhile, Miami missed three straight shots in the coursework of span of the second.
Wade jab-stepped his way around Garnett - faking him badly - for a three-point play, then used some more fancy footwork to get free of Allen for a 3-pointer & a 47-40 lead with five seconds left in the half. Rondo made a pair of free throws with 0.9 ticks remaining, after referee Greg Willard determined he was bumped at midcourt by James Jones.
"We must discover a way to finish quarters better," Rivers said.
NOTES: All-Star guard Chris Paul sat near the Heat bench, with longtime James confidant Maverick Carter. \.\. Shaquille O'Neal (calf) was out again for Boston, while the Heat said Udonis Haslem (foot) still "isn't ready" to return from November foot surgical procedure. \.\. Pierce played 33 minutes, giving him three,259 in his Celtics playoff career, passing Dennis Johnson (three,258) for seventh in franchise history. \.\. Heat guard Mike Bibby's steal with 41 seconds left in the first quarter was his 100th in 87 playoff games.
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