The Miami Heat and Indiana Pacers are playing Game 4 on the NBA playoffs schedule on Monday night and the matchup comes with LeBron James and company up 2-1 in the eastern conference finals and the matchup is streaming online and on TV from ESPN and the WatchESPN website at 8:30 pm ET and is live from American Airlines Arena.
LeBron James and Dwyane Wade took over the game in the fourth quarter to get the win and now they are up 2-1 in the series and looking for a commanding lead. James had 26 points and added seven assists in the game and the Miami Heat got the dominating win 99-87 and now they have the second game in Florida before heading back to Indy. The Pacers are not worried, but if they lose this next game they will have some major issues and it comes after a nice performance from Lance Stephenson and he will be front and center after what he said about LeBron James.
Chris Andresen and Wade made impacts in Game 3 and now they will be main focuses for the matchup on Monday night and it comes as the nation celebrates Memorial Day. The Pacers wanted home court advantage all year after losing to the Heat in the eastern conference finals last year and now they have the chance to get that back with a win against Miami on the road. Stephenson has played well and he made some comments about the trash talk from James and while that is mostly gamesmanship, the Pacers clearly are on the defensive and the series easily could slip away if they lose on Monday night.
The Miami Heat were able to rebound from a 14 point lead in Game 3 and they just continued coming back through the middle part of the game and eventually pulled ahead and never looked back. Players like Norris Cole, Chris Andersen and Mario Chalmers have been contributing and players like Paul George and Roy Hibbert will have to step up for Indiana. George is leading the team with 21 points per game and nearly eight rebounds, but he was terrible in the last game and he will need to be much better from the floor after playing his shortest amount of minutes in the playoffs.
James has continued his impressive playoffs run and now Miami will try and put the Pacers back for the third straight season as they are looking for championship number three and this would be the fourth time they won the east in the last four years if they can finish things off. The Pacers are pressing a bit and the comments from Stephenson and David West show that a bit and they are a talented team and this series surely is not over yet. James has been the primary focus for the Heat in this series and he is leading Miami in scoring rebounding and assists in the playoffs and while Kevin Durant did win the MVP over him, James has been just as good in the postseason. Durant and the OKC Thunder bounced back and now that series with the Spurs is 2-1 in the west finals.
Check here for the Miami Heat and Indiana Pacers live coverage for the NBA playoffs from ESPN.