The Boston Celtics beat the Miami Heat 143–110 on Thursday night. Jayson Tatum scored 26 points, Kristaps Porzingis had 19 before he sprained his left ankle, and they made 22 3-pointers.
The NBA’s best team, the Celtics, got 18 points from Jaylen Brown, 17 from Jrue Holiday, and 15 from Derrick White. They are now 35-10 and have won both games this season against the team that beat them in the Eastern Conference playoffs last year.
The 143 points scored by Boston were the most they had ever scored against Miami, and the 33-point spread was the biggest win Boston had ever had over Miami in 172 games, including playoff games.
The Celtics scored the most points against the Heat in a win on April 12, 1990, by a score of 139–118. Thursday, Boston made 64% of its shots and had 47 more rebounds than Miami.
T. Tyler Herro and Bam Adebayo both scored 19 points for Miami. Jimmy Butler added 17 points for the Heat. The last time the Heat lost five games in a row was March 2021, when they lost six games in a row.
FanDuel Sportsbook said that the Heat were 8 1/2-point favorites before the game. On February 27, 2019, Golden State was a 9 1/2-point favorite in their own building, but Miami won 126–125. This was the last time they were that much of an underdog there.
That kind of finish didn’t happen in this case for Miami. Not at all.
It didn’t take long for Boston to show why the oddsmakers made the choices they did. In the first quarter, the Celtics went on a run of 18-7 points that made the score 40-25. From there, Boston was on a roll. In the first half, Boston led 77–64, and the Celtics were in complete charge.
Things got worse for Miami.
This season, the Heat have given up an average of 110.5 points per game. With one minute left in the third quarter, Boston had 111 points, and they went into the fourth quarter ahead 113-90. It was only the fourth time in Heat history that they gave up that many points in the first 36 minutes of a game, and that doesn’t count the playoffs.
In three of its last five games, Miami has been behind by at least 24 points: 37 points at Toronto on January 17 and 24 points at Orlando on Sunday. Boston’s biggest lead Thursday was 34 points. In the end, those three games were the three worst losses for the Heat this season.