The NBA postseason is here, and it’s shaping up to be a wide-open chase to the 2022 title. The Phoenix Suns go 2-0 up on Mavericks and the Miami Heat beat Philadelphia 76ers again.
The Phoenix Suns ran away with the league’s best regular-season record — eight games clear of the second-best Memphis Grizzlies.
Devin Booker, Chris Paul and the reigning Western Conference champs are on a mission to redeem themselves after last season’s six-game Finals defeat to the Milwaukee Bucks; they survived an injury to Booker to knock out the New Orleans Pelicans in the first round.
Plenty of West contenders still stand in the Suns’ way, including Ja Morant and the Grizzlies, Luka Doncic and the Dallas Mavericks and the Golden State Warriors, who are back in the playoffs for the first time since reaching the Finals in 2019.
In the East, the defending champion Bucks are the 3-seed in a log-jammed conference — the top-seeded Miami Heat, Boston Celtics, Bucks and Philadelphia 76ers were separated by just two games in the final regular-season standings and all advanced to the second round.
The top-seeded Phoenix Suns were braced for another fourth-quarter playoff fight on Wednesday night. Chris Paul turned it into an early knockout.
The 12-time All-Star scored 28 points, including 14 in another spectacular final quarter, to lead the Suns over the Dallas Mavericks 129-109 for a 2-0 lead in the Western Conference semifinals.
The Mavericks will go home in a 2-0 hole, desperately needing contributions from someone other than Luka Doncic, who scored 35 points on 13-of-22 shooting, two nights after a 45-point performance in Game 1.
Bam Adebayo scored 23 points and Jimmy Butler had 22 points and 12 assists, as the Heat beat the Philadelphia 76ers 119-103 on Wednesday night for a 2-0 lead in the Eastern Conference semifinals in the absence of Philly’s star player Joel Embiid.
Miami has taken a 2-0 lead in 18 previous series, including the first round this season against Atlanta, and won the matchup every time. The 76ers’ franchise has dropped the first two games of a matchup on 19 other occasions, never recovering to win the series.
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