Dave Hyde: Butler has a night for the ages as Heat shock Lakers in Game 3
Before we go any further in the column – before we even get to the column – tip your cap to Jimmy Butler as you read the next three lines:
Forty points.
Thirteen assists.
Eleven rebounds.
Jimmy Butler’s performance in Game 3 of the NBA Finals on Sunday night is the story of sports. He picked up the Heat and dragged it to a 115-104 win over the Los Angeles Lakers was as good a night on as big a stage in as desperate a situation as any South Florida athlete has ever had.
It goes down with Larry Csonka’s 145 yards rushing in Super Bowl VIII. It goes with Josh Beckett’s complete game in Game 6 at Yankee Stadium in 2003. It goes with LeBron James’ 45-point, 15-rebound game in Game 6 at Boston Garden in 2012.
Butler’s performance came with a soundtrack, too.
“You’re in trouble,” he said to LeBron James, repeating the words the Loos Angeles Lakers star said to him earlier in the game.
Butler picked up a team no one gave a chance, that looked dead on the road with two of its top players injured, and carried it to a 115-104 win in Game 3 of the NBA Finals. He breathed life back into the Heat season Sunday night. He. Him.
“That’s who he is,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said.
“He did everything for us,” Tyler Herro said.
Even as the Heat led throughout this game, you still didn’t trust this outcome could happen. Did you? Surely LeBron and Anthony Davis would pick up the Lakers, just as they had all playoffs. The Heat couldn’t just keep riding Butler, too.
What was he thinking out there?
“We won,” he said. “I could care less about (the numbers). We play this game to win. I’m glad my teammates have a lot faith in me to go out and hoop like that.”
Spoelstra played him all but about two minutes entering the fourth quarter. He tried to buy Butler a little time at the break with the Heat leading 85-80 lead. His rest lasted 58 seconds. LeBron got a three-point play and back came Butler.
He passed to Jae Crowder for an easy shot to make it 89-83. He took LeBron into the lane and got off a quick shot to tie it 91-91.
LeBron got called for a traveling on the next possession. LeBron lost the ball in the lane on the one after that. Do you see what was happening here?
Butler made a pass artistic bounce pass down the lane to Kelly Olynyk for a layin. And then LeBron was called for another travel. This was a LeBron down the stretch you hadn’t seen in a big moment since that disappearing act in Game 6 against Dallas in the 2011 Finals when he was with the Heat.
With 3:19 left, Walker drove an empty baseline and was fouled by LeBron under the basket. LeBron came up complaining.
“He elbowed me!” he yelled. “He elbowed me!”
Butler just sank his free throws. And kept going. With 1:47 left, he drove the lane and was hacked by Rajon Rondo. He lay on the floor, exhausted, for a few precious seconds.
He then got up and made both foul shots for a 107-100 lead. For the first time, you thought maybe. Just maybe. Maybe this team no one thought could get this far could go a little further.
Some quotes make sense at the time and tell a different story in retrospect. After the first quarter, Lakers coach Frank Vogel said after the first quarter: “We had 10 turnovers in the first quarter, and down three. I like where we’re at.”
Were these really the Lakers with two of the best four players in the game with LeBron and Anthony Davis? The Lakers who have lost just one game in each of their previous two series? Those Lakers?
LeBron stumbled down the stretch and had eight turnovers with his 25 points. Davis was invisible in good part because he was in foul trouble. He immediately picked up his fourth in the second half when Meyers Leonard made a big play by sacrificing his face to be slapped by Davis.
Butler was asked after the game what was the difference.
“Rebounds,” he said.
No, rebounds had to get in line behind Butler. Circle the night and put it in lights. South Florida’s never seen a bigger star on a bigger, more desperate stage.
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