Celts Roll To Heat Season Sweep

Where others have struggled against the Miami Heat, the Boston Celtics have thrived.

"Sometimes a bad team will match up well against a good team," Boston's Dana Barros said after the Celtics completed a three-game sweep of the Heat with a 107-96 romp Thursday night. "We just happen to match up well against them. I don't know why."

Rookie Paul Pierce scored 10 of his season-high 31 points, including two 3-pointers, during a 15-0 spree late in the third quarter as the Celtics ran off to a 21-point lead and held off Miami's comeback attempt.

Boston's 40 points in the quarter was the most by any Miami opponent this season. The Heat has allowed 100 points just three times this season, twice to the Celtics.

"We got our heads handed to us," said Heat coach Pat Riley, who needed an extra five minutes or so to digest the outcome before addressing the media. "They had a run in the third quarter that was too hard for our guys to come from behind."

Boston became only the second team this year to shoot better than 50 percent against the Heat, hitting 41 of 74 field-goal attempts (55 percent). The Celtics shot 9-for-17 from 3-point range, including 7-for-7 in the third.

Barros added 27 points on 9-for-10 shooting, including four 3-pointers, and Ron Mercer had 19 points. The performance came despite the absence of leading scorer Antoine Walker, who missed his seventh straight game with a sprained left ankle.

The Celtics also beat Miami on Feb. 6 an April 16, sweeping the Heat for the first time since 1989-90.

"We played great basketball all three times," Celtics coach Rick Pitino said. "They're a better basketball team than we are, but we managed to find ways to win."

The loss left Miami's magic number for clinching the top playoff seed in the Eastern Conference at two. The Heat leads Orlando by one game in the Atlantic Division, with four games left for Miami and two for Orlando.

Tim Hardaway and the Heat couldn't push Ron Mercer and the Celtics around. (AP)

"We showed nothing tonight," Heat forward P.J. Brown said. "If we play like that again in the playoffs, it's going to be another short stay."

Clarence Weatherspoon, making his second start in place of the injured Alonzo Mourning, led Miami with 19 points. Mourning missed his second straight game with a slightly fractured right eye socket suffered Monday night against Cleveland.

"They were missing a great defensive player," Barros said. "They don't have great individual defenders, but they play great team defense. It's hard when you're missing the guy in the middle."

Miami led 52-51 at halftime and 64-63 midway through the third quarter before Boston ran off eight straight points, taking a 71-64 advantage on two free throws by Walter McCarty with 5:55 left.

Miami closed within 74-68, then went scoreless for the next 3:42 as the Celtics pulled away. The final nine points came on a trio of 3-pointers, the last by Pierce giving Boston an 89-68 advantage with 1:47 left in the period.

"I've seen nothing like that all year," Weatherspoon said. "They were making (short jumpers), you'd try to push them out to the 3-point line, and they were still making them."

The Heat used a 19-4 burst in the fourth quarter to pull within 96-89 on Tim Hardaway's 3-pointer with 6:38 left, but Boston scored the next five points to seal the outcome.

Notes:

• Mourning said he will wear goggles rather than a face mask when he returns to action this weekend, most likely Sunday against Charlotte. "I've played with goggles before, in Charlotte when I got poked in the eye," he said. "I've just got to adjust to the situation. There's not much more I can do." Mourning wore face mask late last season for a broken cheekbone, but complained that it hampered his peripheral vision.
• Boston's Greg Minor apparently is done for the season after badly injuring his right hip late in the first quarter. Minor took a fall while running downcourt and could be heard screaming in pain as trainers attended to him. X-rays were inconclusive, but Pitino called it a "very, very serious injury."

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