A 3-0 deficit as a favorite? Why the Celtics will make history if they win Game 6 (2024)

The Athletic has live coverage of Eastern Conference Final game 7 between the Celtics vs Heat.

What a difference a week makes.

After the Miami Heat blew out the Boston Celtics on Sunday night, both NBA conference finals were 3-0. No team in league history has come back to win a best-of-seven postseason series after losing the first three games. When the Denver Nuggets edged the Los Angeles Lakers on Monday night to complete their first sweep in franchise history, the record for NBA teams holding a 3-0 lead in a series moved to 150-0.

It looked like a different kind of history would be set Tuesday in Miami with the Heat leading 61-52 with 10:39 left in the third quarter of Game 4. The last time the NBA had sweeps in both conference finals was in 1957, when the Celtics beat the Syracuse Nationals in the East, while the St. Louis Hawks beat the Minneapolis Lakers in the West. (Those 1957 series were three-game sweeps; the NBA changed division/conference finals to best of seven in 1958, and since then, there have never been sweeps in both conferences in the same year.)

But the Celtics made that point moot with a dominant second half in a 116-99 Game 4 win. And after the Celtics carried that momentum back to Boston to beat the Heat on Thursday night, they became only the third team in NBA history to force a Game 6 in the conference finals after trailing 3-0. On Saturday, the Celtics will look to become the first team in that group to force a Game 7 after losing the first three games.

The situation the Celtics and the Heat are facing in 2023 has some striking similarities to the 2010 Eastern Conference finals. The Celtics were on the other side of the equation 13 years ago as the lower seed (No. 4) that had knocked off the No. 1 seed earlier in the postseason. They, too, took a 3-0 lead in a rematch against the defending conference champion, one that led the NBA in percentage of points from 3. The Heat now are what the Celtics were in 2010: a lower seed (No. 8 in their case) up 3-0 in a rematch against a team that beat them in the postseason a year ago and was second in the NBA in percentage of points from 3.

The 2010 Eastern Conference finals started about the same way the 2023 series began. After two relatively close wins by the road underdogs in Games 1 and 2 in Orlando, the Celtics came home in Game 3 to embarrass the Magic and take a 3-0 lead, similar to how the Heat pushed the Celtics to the brink this year after winning Game 3 in humiliating fashion.

Just as the Celtics have done this season, the 2010 Magic got back into the series with a Game 4 road win (96-92 in overtime at Boston) and a blowout home win in Game 5 (113-92 at Orlando), led by superb two-way play from center Dwight Howard. But in Boston’s last chance to end the series at home in Game 6, Paul Pierce came through with game highs of 31 points and 13 rebounds and the Celtics eliminated the Magic with a 96-84 victory – a game that Boston led comfortably by double digits for all of the last three quarters.

That’s the kind of response the Heat would gladly accept Saturday night at home after failing to break 100 points in the last two games against the Celtics.

If Miami can’t do that, it would make history of a different kind. Of the 150 teams in any round to trail 3-0 in a best-of-7 playoff series, only three forced a Game 7. All three had to play Game 7 on the road, where they lost.

The last playoff team down 3-0 to force a Game 7 was the 2003 Portland Trail Blazers in the first year the NBA expanded its first round from best of five to best of seven. After famously losing Game 7 of the 2000 Western Conference finals to the Lakers, the Blazers were swept in the first round by the very same opponent in their next two first-round series. By the time Game 4 of the 2003 quarterfinal series against the Dallas Mavericks rolled around, the Blazers had lost 10 straight playoff games.

Portland picked itself off the mat after inserting Zach Randolph into their starting lineup, winning three straight games to force a Game 7 in Dallas. But after the Trail Blazers took a 73-71 lead into the fourth quarter, Mavericks star Dirk Nowitzki got critical help from Nick Van Exel to finally eliminate Portland. The next season, the Blazers’ streak of 21 straight postseason appearances ended.

The Denver Nuggets were the eighth seed in 1994 when they trailed the fifth-seeded Utah Jazz 3-0 in the West semifinals. That Nuggets team was the first eighth seed ever to beat a No. 1 seed, eliminating the Seattle SuperSonics after losing the first two games of that series. Their season was already a success because of that victory.

Instead, Denver won three straight games against a suddenly reeling Jazz team to force a Game 7, triumphing in contests decided by one point, in double overtime, and three points. With Utah at home for Game 7, the Nuggets were held to 12 first-quarter points while Karl Malone led the Jazz with 31 points and 14 rebounds in a decisive 91-81 win to advance to the Western Conference finals, where they lost to the eventual NBA champion Houston Rockets.

The most riveting of the Game 7s set up by teams trailing 3-0 in a series was the 1951 NBA Finals, played by the Arnie Risen-led Rochester Royals (ancestor of the current Sacramento Kings) and their interstate rivals, the New York Knicks. This was the only NBA Finals in a six-year pre-shot-clock span that did not feature the Minneapolis Lakers, who had won the previous two championships. The Royals beat the George Mikan-led Lakers in the West Division finals, then took a 3-0 lead over the Knicks by winning the first three games of the series by a combined 49 points.

New York turned things around by keeping Games 4-6 close by halftime and outplaying the Royals in the second halves. Nat “Sweetwater” Clifton, the first African American to sign an NBA contract, had double-doubles in Games 4 and 5 while helping to keep Risen in check.

In Game 7 at Rochester’s Edgerton Park Arena, the Knicks held a 74-72 lead with 2:30 left to play and had possession with no shot clock. Royals point guard Bob Davies stole the ball from fellow Hall of Famer Max Zaslofsky, but Risen scored the go-ahead points for the Royals, and the Knicks never had the lead again. Davies broke the final tie of the game with two free throws with 44 seconds left, and Jack Coleman scored a victory-sealing basket with three seconds to play. The Royals won Game 7, 79-75, for their only championship; the franchise has never been back to the finals. The Knicks lost the next two finals to the Lakers and didn’t win their first title until 1970.

History will be made either way this weekend, as the Heat are looking to join the 1999 New York Knicks as the second eighth seed (and first in a non-lockout season) to appear in the NBA Finals. But a win Saturday night by the Celtics in Miami would set up a Memorial Day Game 7 first in Boston, with the Celtics becoming the first team in NBA history with the opportunity to win a Game 7 at home after trailing 3-0 in a series.

Unlike the 1951 Knicks, the 1994 Nuggets or the 2003 Blazers, the Celtics were the second-best team in the NBA this regular season. They’re playing for a chance to host Game 1 of the NBA Finals. As for the Heat? They have yet to face elimination since clinching a playoff spot via the second Play-In game at home against the 10th-seed Chicago Bulls.

Having to go to Boston for a Game 7, against a team that has already won one Game 7 at home this postseason, is not just an unenviable position for the Heat to be in. It’s one that no team in NBA history that has ever gone up 3-0 in a series has ever had to face.

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(Photo: Chris Marion / NBAE via Getty Images)