LeBron James had 30 points, nine rebounds and nine assists and the Los Angeles Lakers eliminated the defending NBA champion Golden State Warriors with a 122-101 victory Friday night in Game 6 of the second-round series.
The seventh-seeded Lakers will face Nikola Jokic and the top-seeded Nuggets in the Western Conference finals starting Tuesday night in Denver.
Anthony Davis had 17 points and 20 rebounds for the Lakers, who never trailed in a closeout victory that punctuated their increasingly incredible late-season surge.
Austin Reaves scored 23 points, highlighted by a 54-footer from midcourt at the halftime buzzer for the Lakers. They improved to 7-0 at home since the regular season ended with three wins in seven days over the Warriors. Los Angeles also snapped Golden State’s streak of 28 playoff series with at least one road victory – an NBA-record run encompassing Stephen Curry’s entire career.
Davis said he attributes the Lakers’ late-season roll to “togetherness. We want to shock the world.”
James, Davis and the Lakers are the first team since 2014 to eliminate Curry’s Warriors from the playoffs before the NBA finals. Golden State have played in six of the last eight NBA finals, missing the playoffs entirely in the other two seasons.
Curry scored 32 points while missing 10 of his 14 three-point attempts for the sixth-seeded Warriors, whose pursuit of their fifth championship in nine seasons ended with three straight road losses and an inept offensive performance by Curry’s teammates in Game 6, including a 3-of-19 effort by Klay Thompson, who missed 10 of his 12 three-point attempts.
The Splash Brothers were far too dry when it mattered against the Lakers: Thompson went 10 for 36 on three-pointers in the series’ final four games, while Curry was 14 for 49.
Donte DiVincenzo had a playoff-high 16 points for the Warriors, but Curry was their only starter in double figures, with the other four shooting 11 for 38.
The Lakers immediately took charge in the first quarter, survived the Warriors’ few rallies and blew it open in the fourth quarter with a balanced effort led by the 38-year-old James, a four-time NBA champion. The 20-year veteran can still assert his will as forcefully as almost any elite player, and he quarterbacked the Lakers’ offensive effort while Davis played another standout defensive game.
D’Angelo Russell scored 19 points as the Lakers capably survived the third-quarter ejection of Dennis Schröder, the sparkplug guard and primary defender on Curry. Schröder was tossed after receiving his second technical foul of the night from an exchange with Draymond Green, but his absence scarcely seemed to help the Warriors, who couldn’t make their open shots far too often.
The Lakers haven’t lost back-to-back games since 17 March, and they’ve lost just once at home since 26 March. On a 27-12 roll since bolstering their supporting cast around James and Davis at the trade deadline, Los Angeles is headed to the conference finals for the second time in the superstars’ four-year partnership.
After knocking off the second-seeded Memphis Grizzlies in six games in the first round, the Lakers followed that series’ exact win-loss pattern against the champs: Steal Game 1 on the road, and then coolly capitalize on their homecourt advantage to seal the series with three straight wins in front of their frenzied, celebrity-studded crowds.
Schröder had five assists and defended doggedly in his first start of the postseason for the Lakers, but the German points guard was ejected on a curious call after Green pushed the ball into Schröder’s face.
New York Knicks 92-96 Miami Heat
Jimmy Butler scored 24 points, Bam Adebayo added 23 and the Miami Heat are headed back to the Eastern Conference finals after topping the New York Knicks 96-92 on Friday night.
Max Strus scored 14 points and Kyle Lowry had 11 points and nine assists for the eighth-seeded Heat, who won the semi-final series 4-2 to go to the conference finals for the 10th time overall and the third time in the last four years.
Miami became the second No 8 seed in NBA history to make the conference finals – joining the Knicks, who pulled it off in 1999. The Heat will visit Boston or Philadelphia in Game 1 on Wednesday. The Celtics and 76ers play Game 7 of their series Sunday.
Jalen Brunson was spectacular for New York, scoring 41 points on 14-for-22 shooting. But his teammates combined for only 51 points – Julius Randle had 15 and RJ Barrett 11 on 1-for-10 shooting. Josh Hart also had 11 points for the Knicks.
It was dicey at the end, but Miami survived. Gabe Vincent was called for a flagrant-1 against Brunson with just under a minute left, starting a run where the Knicks scored four points in 4.6 seconds.
Brunson made the free throws, Hart added a layup and a 92-86 lead was down to 92-90.
The Knicks got a stop at the other end, but never got a shot off on the next possession. Lowry knocked the ball away for a steal, Butler made two free throws with 14.4 seconds left and the countdown back to the NBA’s final four was on.
Miami was whistled for four fouls in the first 2:15 of the fourth quarter, setting the tone for New York to keep getting to the line throughout the final period.
The Knicks tied it early in the third, but missed 10 other field-goal attempts in the second half – along with two free throws – that would have pulled New York into a tie or given it the lead.
Miami bent – but never broke. Vincent set up Adebayo for a dunk with 1:05 left that put Miami up 92-86, and at that point it became a matter of getting stops.
Brunson had 22 points in the first half, tying his third-most before intermission in any game this season – and his most ever by halftime of a playoff game. He had 15 in the first quarter when the Knicks came out flying to grab early control.
New York led 14 in the opening quarter, and Miami never led by more than two in the first 24 minutes. But it was Miami with the lead at the half, going up 51-50 by the break in large part because it finally kept New York off the line.
The Knicks made 11 free throws in the first quarter — the most by any Heat opponent this season and tying the fourth-most against Miami in an opening period over the last decade. But they didn’t even get to the line in the final 15:16 of the half.
The score to that point: Knicks 29, Heat 17. The score over the rest of the half: Heat 34, Knicks 21, even though Miami was getting outscored 21-6 from three-point range in the opening two periods.
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