Originally compiled from: The Athletic
Written by Steve Buckley
原标题：Celtics’ buzzer-beater was thing of beauty. Game 7 will be too, with stars and starry-eye
The Eastern Final G7 is coming, who are you more optimistic about this time?
The G6 race is so twisty
From the moment everyone woke up on Saturday morning, it was as if the Miami Heat were four points behind. They spent the night at the Cassia Center in Miami, lurking in Game 6 of the Eastern Conference Finals, wandering back and forth, not keeping a big enough lead despite the Celtics leading all the way. Even with 4 minutes left in the game, they led by 10 points. Yes. Everyone knows this.
What doesn't seem real always happens unexpectedly. With three seconds left in the game, the Celtics suddenly found themselves one point behind before Derrick White passed the ball to Marcus Smart that ended up winning G6 and putting Boston on Monday on the verge of a record-making seventh game. But Smart's shot popped up in the basket, and White rushed over from the left to make the ball in, and the Celtics won 104-103.
The timer rang, but it was too late to save the Heat. The red light was already on, but, again, it was too late. If White had gotten that ball a sixteenth of a second later, the Heat would have made it to the NBA Finals. As for the Celtics, they will get a little credit for their tenacity for making things interesting. Then the "unfinished business" will be revisited.
But White's ball did go in, beautiful, clean and legitimate, which only adds to the story. Regardless, Game 7 Monday night at Garden Court will be one of the most important moments in Boston's sporting history, because — as you've heard, no NBA team wins a best-of-seven series after losing the first three games.
The G7 will determine history
But now, precisely because of the way the sixth game ends, it will become even more important. We can look at it this way: what follows is not just a historical event, but also a legend. Think of the athletes who looked unlikely to be Boston playoff heroes over the years. Consider Bernie Cabo in Game 6 of the 1975 World Series Baseball, where Carlton Fisk hit a three-point home run from outside the foul stick in the left field before the start of the 12th inning, igniting the crowd at Fenway Stadium. Think about it, in Super Bowl 49, the nameless Malcolm Butler twisted his body and made that incredible interception in front of Russell Wilson to save the Patriots.
Fisk was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Patriots quarterback Tom Brady is also on his way to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. For the sake of discussion, let's assume that Jason Tatum and Jaylen Brown are completing their own Hall of Famer careers.
But Capo is not a Hall of Famer, and Butler and White are unlikely to be Hall of Famer. There's also Joe Mazura, the 34-year-old Celtics' rookie coach, whose name I couldn't name a few days ago, with a "four" in front of it. This is someone who is likely to coach and enter the Hall of Fame smoothly for the next 35 years, but that's all for later. Much later. Now he's just a rookie coach.
It will be a G7 that will never be forgotten. But while the game already has enough stars, the highlight of this game is that it will have some people full of fantasies about the future. There's Derek White, whose basket shot from Smart has become a classic rival to Havljuček's steal.
White's performance was a foil to Game 7. While everyone else was marveling or hyping up the performance, Mazura said only superficially that it was just a foil for Game 7.
Yes, the Celtics may be working hard right now to bring Kevin Miller-David Otis Tim Wakefield of the 2004 Red Sox to the Garden Court on Monday night — when they turned "0-3" into a seven-game series win.
White brought the series to a climax
But this Celtic-Heat series is about Mazura choosing to trust his instincts. It's about White going to the basket to make up for the kill. Everyone agrees that these two men are the reason for the seventh game on Monday night.
After the game, White was taken into an interview room and, naturally, he was asked to "tell us" about the last game. Here's what he said: "I mean, I just pass the ball in. (Gabe) Vincent was near me, and he seemed to be on top of Tatum. So I couldn't give him the ball, and they were well on top of Brown. Smart flashed, shot, and nobody really pushed me up, so I ran into the bottom corner, and when he shot, I wanted to rush in. Then the ball went into my hand and I threw it in. That's what I see. ”
Actually, it was Max Strus who missed White, but the beauty of this quote lies in its facts. Derek White is not instantly recognizable by name alone, like LeBron, "The Magician" or Larry. He's not the straw that can stir a drink, as baseball star Reggie Jackson once called himself. Just as basketball players who are millionaires can also be called blue-collar, White is like that.
When a reporter said White's father said his son had never scored a killer goal before, White said, "First ever lore goal? I definitely had something special in college. I'm going to ask my dad. ”
But he couldn't think of one for a while. Even if he did, it would not be comparable to this one.
As for Mazura, he was too young, too inexperienced, and too obscure to provide interesting stories and clever quotes. But look where he is: He will coach the Celtics on Monday night, one of the most important seventh games in the team's history.
I know about the Red Sox in 2004. Miller, Ortiz, Wakefield, these people should definitely be there. Like they said in basketball, the victory was like a stunning slam dunk.
But it would be cool if Bernie Capo and Malcolm Butler were also there, representing the sporting staff.
Now it's up to who can win the Big Seven battle?