Heat shocks Celtics in Game 2 to even series at 1-1 behind historic three-point shooting display

The Boston Celtics led from start to finish and dominated the Miami Heat in Game 1. But the Heat made sure Game 2 was different, putting together an impressive effort to make it an ultra-competitive affair that included 13 lead changes.

The result was different, too.

The short-handed eighth-seeded Heat bounced back from a 20-point loss in Game 1, shocking the top-seeded Celtics 111-101 in Game 2 on Wednesday night at TD Garden to steal home-court advantage and even the first-round playoff series 1-1.

The Heat did it by setting a new franchise record for threes made in a playoff game, shooting 23 of 43 (53.5 percent) from three-point range. It’s also tied for the second-most threes the Heat has made in any game in franchise history.

“It was a very good response just from the connectivity, the efforts, all of that,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said after the win in Boston. “And then we also made some shots. That always looks better when you make some shots.”

Trailing by three points at halftime, the Heat outscored the Celtics 27-18 in the third quarter to take control of the game and enter the fourth quarter ahead by six points.

The Heat led the rest of the way, pulling ahead by as many as 11 points in the fourth quarter to escape with the upset victory. Miami held Boston to just 40 points in the second half.

Playing without two of its best players in Jimmy Butler (sprained MCL) and Terry Rozier (neck spasms), the Heat still had enough because of quality contributions throughout the rotation.

Five Heat players finished with double-digit points and three Heat players scored more than 20 points.

Tyler Herro led the way for the Heat with a team-high 24 points and career-high 14 assists.

Bam Adebayo added 21 points on 9-of-13 shooting from the field and 10 rebounds.

Caleb Martin recorded 21 points and shot 5 of 6 on threes.

For the Celtics, Jaylen Brown (33 points) and Jayson Tatum (28 points) combined for 61 points. But the rest of the Celtics’ roster combined for just 40 points on 14 of 37 (37.8 percent) from the field in Game 2.

Celtics center Krisaps Porzingis was limited to six points on 1-of-9 shooting from the field. Boston was outscored by 32 points with Porzingis on the court in Game 2.

Wednesday marked just the fifth game the Celtics have lost at home this season. Boston finished the regular season with an NBA-best 37-4 record at home.

“It’s always a good thing if you can get one on the road, especially here,” Martin said. “It’s a tough, tough place to play against a very tough team. You’re always going to try to at least steal one, and we were able to do that.”

The series now moves to Miami for the next two games, with Game 3 set for Saturday at Kaseya Center (6 p.m., TNT and Bally Sports Sun).

Five takeaways from the Heat’s win over the Celtics on Wednesday:

After being outscored by 30 points from three-point range in Game 1, the Heat flipped the script.

In an effort to tilt the math in its favor against a Celtics team that is known for taking and making a lot of three-pointers, the Heat came out shooting a high volume of threes in Game 2. In fact, 16 of Miami’s first 20 shots on Wednesday came from three-point range.

The Heat made a lot of them, too, shooting 13 of 24 (54.2 percent) from behind the arc in the first half of Game 2 to set a new franchise record for the most made threes in any playoff half.

The Heat continued to take and make threes in the second half, shooting 10 of 19 (52.6 percent) on threes in the final two quarters to set a new franchise record for the most made threes in a playoff game with 23 makes from deep on Wednesday. It also marked the most three-pointers that the Heat has made in any game this season.

“Those are the available shots,” Spoelstra said of the Heat’s three-pointers in Game 2. “You have to trust, whether it’s a make or a miss. That’s the right play and you have to make that play over and over and over, and we were doing that tonight.”

With Boston shooting 12 of 32 (37.5 percent) on threes, the Heat outscored the Celtics 69-36 from deep in Game 2.

Herro made a team-high six threes for the Heat on 11 attempts. Martin hit five threes. And Jaime Jaquez Jr., Nikola Jovic and Haywood Highsmith each sank three threes.

The Heat improved to 19-7 this season when shooting better than 40 percent from three-point range.

The Heat’s incredible three-point shooting display negated the Celtics’ 46-26 edge in the paint in Game 2. Miami won despite making just five shots at the rim on Wednesday.

With Butler sidelined, the duo of Adebayo and Herro stepped up to lead the way for the Heat and deliver a signature playoff moment.

After combining for 35 points on 31 shots in Game 1, Adebayo and Herro combined for 45 points on 26 shots in Game 2.

Adebayo was effective around the basket, shooting 8 of 11 in the paint. He scored eight points on 4-of-5 shooting in the fourth quarter while also defending Tatum for most of the game.

“He was great when we needed to get it settled and he went right to his spot and was able to get some relief points for us,” Spoelstra said of Adebayo.

Herro did it all for the Heat’s offense, scoring a team-high 24 points and dishing out a team-high 14 assists. It marked the third playoff double-double he has recorded in his career and the first one he’s done with 10-plus assists.

Herro did most of his scoring from three-point range, scoring 18 of his 24 points from behind the arc with a team-high six made threes.

“Based on how we look right now [without Butler and Rozier], he’s going to be involved one way or another and sometimes that’s going to be making the right play over and over and over if that’s the right read,” Spoelstra said. “He did that tonight.”

The Heat outscored the Celtics by 23 points in the 38 minutes that Adebayo and Herro played together in Game 2.

“I feel like we complement each other,” Adebayo said of playing with Herro.

Martin was arguably the Heat’s most valuable player in last season’s Eastern Conference finals series against the Celtics. Martin’s play in Game 2 of this year’s series against the Celtics brought back memories from that time.

Almost exactly 11 months ago, Martin was putting the finishing touches on the best stretch of basketball in his life. On May 29, Martin recorded 26 points on 11-of-16 shooting from the field and 4-of-6 shooting on threes, 10 rebounds, three assists and one steal to help lead the Heat to a win over the Celtics at TD Garden in Game 7 of last season’s East finals.

Martin averaged 19.3 points, 6.4 rebounds and 1.7 assists per game in the East finals while shooting an ultra-efficient 60.2 percent from the field and 22 of 45 (48.9 percent) from three-point range. Butler was named the East finals MVP, but Martin finished second in the voting.

While scoring just four points in Game 1 on Sunday to begin this year’s playoff series against Boston, Martin’s most memorable play in that loss was his hard foul on Tatum that drew scrutiny from those on the Celtics’ side.

But Martin put that in the past to put together a Game 2 performance reminiscent of last season’s East finals.

With the Celtics crowd booing Martin pretty much every time he touched the ball in the wake of his hard foul on Tatum in the final minute of Game 1, Martin scored 21 points on 12 field-goal attempts on Wednesday. He made five threes, but also was responsible for two of the Heat’s five makes from within the restricted area in Game 2.

“He’s a competitor, he’s the ultimate X factor,” Spoelstra said of Martin. “It doesn’t always mean that he’s going to score as many as he did tonight. But he’s the X factor of X factors.”

The Heat’s last two first-round picks continue to flash encouraging signs to start the playoffs.

Jaquez followed up his 16-point NBA playoff debut on Sunday by totaling 14 points, two rebounds, one assist and one steal in Game 2. He shot only 4 of 13 from the field, but hit an important three-pointer to push the Heat’s lead up to nine with 5:37 left in the fourth quarter.

Jovic finished Game 2 with 11 points, nine rebounds, six assists three steals and one block.

Both Jaquez and Jovic have also started for the Heat in the first two games of the series. Jaquez is starting in place of the injured Butler and Jovic has played as a full-time starter for the last few months.

With Wednesday’s upset win, the Heat avoided a situation that not many NBA teams have overcome.

Entering this year’s playoffs, teams that drop the first two games of a best-of-7 series have gone on to lose the series 92.1 percent (27-314) of the time.

Good thing for the Heat, it avoided an 0-2 hole with the Game 2 victory.

The Heat’s history also reflects the long odds it would have faced, as it has rallied to win a best-of-7 playoff series after losing the first two games just once in franchise history. That came in the 2006 NBA Finals, when the Heat came back from a 2-0 series deficit against the Dallas Mavericks by winning four straight games to claim its first NBA championship behind the greatness of Dwyane Wade.

The Heat lost the other six best-of-7 playoff series that it fell behind 2-0 in.

As for the other series in the Heat’s half of the East bracket, the fourth-seeded Cleveland Cavaliers hold a 2-0 series lead over the fifth-seeded Orlando Magic. The winner of the Heat-Celtics series will play the winner of the Cavaliers-Magic series in the second round.