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LAKE BUENA VISTA, Florida – Jimmy Butler loves soccer, and the final scene of the second game of the Eastern Conference semifinals resembled a penalty shot on a penalty shootout.
Only there was no doorman.
This was just a free throw, with no time on the clock, no one else from the Miami Heat or Milwaukee Bucks standing in the lane. Tied game, two chances to make a shot, the result completely in the hands of Butler.
“I wish I could kick it and say that’s how I won it,” Butler said.
It will be enough to take a free kick. Butler got the first to bounce, made a second that was irrelevant, and the Heat took control of their East semi-final showdown with a 116-114 win over the Bucks on Wednesday night (Thursday Manila time). becoming the first No. 5 seed to take a 2-0 series lead over a No. 1 seed.
Butler was fouled by Giannis Antetokounmpo with no time remaining, officials said, a call that was affirmed in a review after the opening whistle. The ball was out of Butler’s hands when Antetokounmpo clearly made contact.
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“I would say that we are disappointed with the judgment, the decision, the timing,” Bucks coach Mike Budenholzer said.
Crew chief Marc Davis said the foul was correct.
“He must be allowed room to land and Giannis contacts him with his left hand on his torso and I felt it affected his balance and didn’t allow him room to land in a normal basketball position,” Davis told a pool reporter. After Game. . “As a result, I judged this to be a shooting foul.”
It was a strange ending to, well, a strange ending.
The Heat were up by six with 27 seconds to play and blew it, Butler gave Milwaukee two points with a very misguided pass – “a terrible IQ play,” he acknowledged – back to the Bucks basket that became a tray for Brook Lopez.
That put Milwaukee to two, and Butler hit a free throw with 7.7 seconds left to put the lead back at three. Khris Middleton was fouled by Goran Dragic, a call Miami argued unsuccessfully, because the Heat unsuccessfully used their challenge on a foul by Lopez that hit a 3 in the first quarter, with 4.3 seconds left, and the All-Star scored all three free games. pull to tie it. Davis, in the group’s post-game report, said Dragic was properly assessed as a foul.
Butler finished with the ball in the deep corner, and Antetokounmpo, the current Defensive Player of the Year, contested.
“I feel like, personally, it was the right play,” Antetokounmpo said.
Then came the whistle and that was it. Milwaukee couldn’t challenge the call; The Bucks used their review to cancel what would have been Antetokounmpo’s fourth foul on a charge call to Butler early in the fourth quarter.
“In the judgment of the officers, the foul occurred, I presume, at some point when it landed,” Budenholzer said. “In the officials’ opinion, it was enough to justify a foul.”
Dragic scored 23 points, Tyler Herro added 17 from the bench and Jae Crowder had 16 for Miami. Bam Adebayo scored 15 points, Butler and Duncan Robinson each had 13 and Kelly Olynyk added 11 for Miami, which is 6-0 this postseason.
“It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know that we were going to try to get that ball into Jimmy’s gloves and see what can happen from there,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said. “He was very patient. There were four seconds left. I think a lot of players would have rushed. He took his time.”
Antetokounmpo had 29 points and 14 rebounds for the Bucks. Middleton scored 23 points for Milwaukee, which got 16 each from Lopez and Eric Bledsoe and 14 from George Hill.
Miami’s lead was 90-86 going into the fourth and Milwaukee had the lead on the first possession of the fourth quarter.
Middleton was fouled on a 3-point attempt, made the first two free throws and the rebound of the third was controlled by the Bucks. Kyle Korver hit a 3-pointer on that rebound to cap a five-point possession for Milwaukee, which was back in the lead for the first time since 14-13.
The Heat were unfazed. They scored 13 of the next 15 points not only to regain the lead, but to take it to 103-93 on a Crowder 3-pointer with 7:50 to play.
They would not continue.
But on one physical night, 71 free kicks were attempted, there were two flagrant fouls and a technique on a play where another flagrant was being considered, the Heat held higher at the end.
“You can’t relax, you can’t get comfortable,” Butler said. “They are too good a team.”
TIP-INS
Heat: Dragic has scored at least 20 points in six straight playoff games. It’s the 12th such streak in Heat history; Dwyane Wade had six, LeBron James had the other five. … André Iguodala left in the third quarter with a sprained right ankle, which he spun as he had no room to land and fell on Korver’s foot.
Bucks: Antetokounmpo, who was 4 of 12 from the free throw line in Game 1, opened 4 of 5 from the line in Game 2. He finished 9 of 13. … Milwaukee rebounded Miami 50-38.
MISSING IN 3
The Heat fouled the Bucks five times on 3-point attempts in the game, including two against Lopez in a 26-second span of the first quarter.
5 ON 1
Since the league moved to the 16-team format in 1984, only four No. 1 seeds have lost the first two games of a first or second round series. Phoenix (1993, in a best of five) and Boston (2017) rallied to win first-round matchups; Toronto was swept by Cleveland in the 2018 Eastern semifinals.
UNTIL NEXT TIME
The third game is on Friday.
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