BOSTON (AP) - Jimmy Butler scored 28 points and Caleb Martin had 26 points and 10 rebounds to help the Miami Heat beat the Celtics 103-84 in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference Finals on Monday night and Boston's unprecedented comeback bid to bounce back.
The Heat led a 3-0 series to reach the NBA Finals for the second time in four seasons. They will face the defending Western Conference champion Nuggets in their first game in Denver Thursday night.
Bam Adebayo scores 12 points and 10 rebounds for Miami, its first since the 1999 New York Knicks. Denver is chasing first place since beating the Los Angeles Lakers on May 22.
Butler was named Eastern Conference Finals Most Valuable Player, an honor honoring Celtics Hall of Famer Larry Bird.
Game 6 hero Derrick White scored 18 points for Boston, who looked to be the first NBA team to come back from a 0-3 deficit in a best-of-seven series. Jaylen Brown had 19 points and eight rebounds but shot 1-9 from 3 points.
Jayson Tatum, who scored 51 points in Game 7 against Philadelphia in the Conference Semifinals, had 14 points and 11 rebounds after twisting his ankle in Game 1 and limping for 42 minutes.
The Celtics led by as many as five points before ending the first quarter on a 14-4 run before scoring 16 of their first 22 points in the second. Boston cut to seven points late in the third quarter, but Miami led 76-66 at halftime and scored the first seven points of the fourth to pull out.
The Heat won their first three games, two of them in Boston, and needed only one win to reach the NBA Finals. Of the 150 teams that have gone 3-0 in an NBA playoff series, not one has managed to do so.
But the Celtics watched the documentary The Boston Red Sox came back from a 3-0 deficit to the New York Yankees en route to the 2004 World Series. When the Celtics went up to Game 4 in Miami, former Yankees Alex Rodriguez and Derek Jeter sat on the sidelines.
Boston won Games 4 and 5 by double digits and took a narrow lead into Game 6 before Miami rallied back and took a one-point lead with 3 seconds remaining. The Heat looked ahead when Marcus Smart's Desperation 3 was blocked, but White scored in the final 10 seconds to seal a decisive Game 7.
Back at home, the Celtics greeted the fans with a pregame video interspersed with highlights from the Red Sox comeback with videos of their own. In 2004, Red Sox pitcher Kevin Millar recorded a message to uplift the crowd.
But the "Celtics", who enjoyed huge favourites, could not repeat this performance.
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