Miami Heat eliminate Boston Celtics to reach NBA Finals

By Selcuk Bugra Gokalp

ANKARA (AA) - The Miami Heat beat the Boston Celtics 103-84 in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference Finals on Tuesday to reach the NBA Finals.

The Heat became the second team in NBA history to reach the finals as an 8th seed in the playoffs, the first team was the New York Knicks back in 1999.

Jimmy Butler dropped 28 points, while Caleb Martin helped with 26 points and 10 rebounds to rally the Heat to the finals at TD Garden, Boston.

"We stayed together as a group. As a team, we talked about going and getting a tough one on the road. We did just that,” Butler said, "But we’re not satisfied. We’re excited. We’re happy. But we’ve got one more to get.”

Jimmy Butler earned the Larry Bird Eastern Conference Finals MVP trophy.

Boston's Jaylen Brown and Derrick White scored 19 and 18 points respectively.

“We failed. I failed and we let the whole city down," Brown commented, “In spite of whatever circumstance we had this year we rose to the occasion. We got to this point and we came up short.”

Meanwhile, the Heat's Turkish center Omer Yurtseven became the fourth Turkish basketball player in history to participate in the NBA Finals. (Mehmet Okur in 2004, Hidayet Turkoglu in 2009 and Cedi Osman in 2018).

The Miami Heat will look for their fourth NBA title against the Denver Nuggets, which eliminated the Los Angeles Lakers 4-0 in the Western Conference Finals and will fight for their maiden title.

The Finals series begins in Denver on June 1.