MIAMI — In the end, the Celtics were the ones who hit the deck in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference finals.
Hit it hard.
Hit it with a thud you could hear all the way up to Back Bay.
Rajon Rondo wanted LeBron James and Dwyane Wade to be the ones to go to the floor Wednesday night. He called on his teammates to do to the Heat what it did to him in Miami’s easy win to open the series. But the Celtics hit the deck here and left in a 2-0 hole after a crushing 115-111 overtime loss.
The Celtics got a classic 44-point, 10-assist game from Rondo, the best player on the floor for most of the night. When you’re the best player on the floor, when James and Wade are in the same building, that is saying something.
“He put the whole team on his shoulders,” Doc Rivers said.
Rondo carried everyone wearing green. Paul Pierce rebounded from his nightmare game in the opener. Ray Allen made a few baskets on those gimpy ankles. Kevin Garnett had his moments. But the Big Three was replaced by the Big One.
Rondo made 16 field goals, hit another 10 foul shots, grabbed eight rebounds and turned the ball over only three times in playing all 53 minutes. The only player to go every last second.
“He showed why he is one of the best point guards in the league,” said Miami’s Mario Chalmers.
He showed it all night, on drives and jumpers and just about everything he threw up at the basket. He buried two threes and missed only eight shots.
“It’s tough for him to play that way and not win the game,” Rivers said. “Basically, he did everything right.”
The Celtics couldn’t win the final five minutes, even with Rondo scoring all 12 of their points in overtime. He did everything right after Rivers criticized him after Game 1 for thinking too much and not just playing.
But this was a team loss. The Celtics couldn’t break through on the Heat’s home court because Wade did in the extra session what James couldn’t do to end regulation.
“I told the guys, they played extremely hard,” Rivers said. “There are things that we can absolutely fix and we can do that and we will be ready on Friday.”
But the Celtics are in a must-win situation Friday in Boston even after James failed to finish them off at the end of regulation. Had two chances, really, but failed to end the game when his layup spun out. He got the rebound, but then his 21-foot jumper over Rondo in the final seconds was too strong.
James went into overtime wearing the goat tag for leaving Ray Allen open on Allen’s game-tying three-pointer in the final 34 seconds of regulation.
Allen’s nightmare of a playoff run continued in Game 1, when he missed six of seven shots. Still, there was no reason for James to lose track of him, because in this game he had made four baskets. But when the ball went inside to Keyon Dooling, James erred by running to guard Dooling, who found Allen for the big three.
Of course, Heat coach Erik Spoelstra was looking only at the positive when his superstar’s mistakes were raised.
“But the thing about LeBron is that he still made game-winning plays,” he said. “He came up with loose balls and big blocks. It’s not always about the shot.”
Spoelstra can say that because he has the luxury of a second closer. Wade showed he can still finish off a playoff opponent as well as Kobe Bryant or James, when he is given the chance to do that.
Wade scored 23 points by making eight of 15 shots after being held to one basket in the first half. The Celtics didn’t knock him down. But they sent waves of extra defenders his way, limiting his chances of driving to the basket.
“We did a great job early and trapped him and took the ball out of his hands and made him a passer,” Rivers said. “I loved the game plan. We just didn’t follow through with it as well as when we first started.”
Instead, Wade closed out Boston on a night when Rondo tried to make Miami hit the deck, all by himself. The Heat didn’t. He and the Celtics did.
