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The Miami Heat’s journey to the Finals
Have the Miami Heat Shut Up the Haters Yet?
By: Nick Garcia
The Miami Heat have a lot to overcome if they want to beat the Boston Celtics
in this upcoming series. This Eastern Conference Finals series is going to be a huge
battle between these two teams who are both desperate to get the NBA Finals. We
saw in Game 1 of this series that the Heat were ready to step to the plate and put the
hard work in. The Miami squad came through in the clutch last night to take the
game 1 victory. The real question is if this is enough to put the doubters and haters
to rest.
Everyone knows that the way Lebron James left Cleveland was frowned upon
by almost the entire fan base of the NBA, except for Miami fans. This caused the
Heat to become the villain team of the NBA. This season the Heat have brought
some of those haters around to understanding why it is that Lebron made the move
to South Beach. But with Chris Bosh injured, the Miami Heat have a whole new set
of challenges in front of them with the Boston Celtics.
Even though we saw Game 1 as a dominating performance by the Heat, the
Boston Celtics are no team to sleep on. The Celtics are an experienced team with
plenty of weapons that could pick apart the Heat if they were at their peak
performance levels, especially with Bosh out of the picture. Bosh’s sudden exit from
the court definitely put a damper on the way the Miami squad was playing, but they
also showed that they turned it around at the end of the Indiana Pacers series. Once
Lebron James got to work, it was a done deal. When Game 4 rolled around, we saw a
complete attitude change by Lebron and the rest of the Heat team, and from
watching Game 1 against the Celtics, it looks like Lebron brought that swagger with
him to the Eastern Conference Finals.
As we saw Lebron bring his swagger, he made sure that his team came just as
hard as he did. Shane Battier came with his A game today and put up a doubledouble in Game 1. When other players come together around the key players like D.
Wade and Lebron and consistently put up points, the Miami Heat are unstoppable.
When the Miami Heat play the way they did in Game 3 against the Pacers, and one of
their team Captains scores 5 points, then they will be defeated every time. Now that
they have overcome that playoff slump, it appears that they are ready to take the
title home.
Whether the Heat take the title home this year or not, the haters are not
going to go anywhere. Miami will never be able to get rid of them all, but they will at
least be able to shut them up if they back up their attitude of being a Championship
team. The attitude that the Big 3 brought to the media when they joined forces is
also what caused some hatred towards this possible dynasty. These guys went out
talking about all the titles that they were going to win, and it may or may not have
been too soon to bring that up! This year is the year that the team has to win the
championship or the season is a “bust.”
This has been the well-known slogan of the Miami Heat this season,
“Championship or bust.” This has got to be driving them to play as good as they
have since game 4 of the Indiana series. This slogan has ESPN and other NBA
analysts going absolutely insane about the Miami Heat whenever they do not play
up to the par that they are expected. As a Miami Heat fan, I hate to see them lose or
for them to be bad mouthed, but I’m a real fan that can admit when the team has
messed up. There’s no reason to sit here and say that the Pacers did not earn their 2
victories when they played at a high level of basketball throughout most of the
series. Nonetheless, the Heat definitely earned their keep with the way they
finished off Indiana.
Lebron James has been playing at a spectacular level ever since they lost
game 3 to the pacers. His self-thrown welcome back party for his team started with
his 40 points, 18 rebounds, and 9 assists performance of game 4. Again, as a Heat
fan, I’m happy to see that the Pacers series pretty much showed this Miami team
that they were not going to be handed the NBA title this year, or any year. If the
Heat would have gone through that little slump against a team like the Celtics, they
may have never come out of it.
As I said before, the Boston Celtics are definitely not a team to sleep on. This
is a team with many years of experience on their side. Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce,
and Ray Allen are all players that have a large number of years that they have been
playing. Rajon Rondo may not be at the top of the list in regards to experience, but
he sure plays like he has the same amount of experience. Rondo is one of the
quickest developing players that we have seen grow over the years. With all these
weapons, the Celtics can attack and score from a lot of different places. However,
they did not show a great example of that during Game 1. Actually, the way they
played gave more of a display that the series was going to be a shut out.
Granted, the Heat played phenomenal with all of their role players stepping
up when they were needed, but the Celtics also let the game get away from them
once the Heat went on a run and took the lead by 15. The fans of the NBA typically
want to see the Eastern and Western conference finals be close games and high
performance games, but unless the Boston Celtics start to play like they have all of
that talent on their team, the Miami Heat will be one step closer to putting those
haters to rest.
Nonetheless, I think the Celtics will be able to put all of their talent to good
use. Based off of game 1, it seems like the Heat are going to sweep the series, or at
least win dominantly. I do not think that this will be the case. Before this series
began, I always said it is going to be the Heat in 5-6 games. No matter what it is that
goes down, I feel like the Miami boys are going to pull everything they have together
and face their next enemies in the Finals. But whoever it is that they face in the
finals will be an entire new set of challenges that the Heat will have to overcome to
be able to make sure the season is not a bust.