Jolinda Wade was standing with her arms in the air – cheering in support of her superstar son. 

Maybe she should step into the Miami front office, because there’s no reason that Dwayne Wade should stick with the Heat after this summer.

Wade had to put on a remarkable performance, scoring 46 points (including 5 three-pointers) to keep the Miami Heat alive to play another game in their opening round series by beating the Boston Celtics, 101-92.

Richardson long-range shooting gave the Heat some life early in Game 4.

Miami jumped out to an early lead behind some strong shooting from Quentin Richardson.  The Heat maintained their lead through halftime, when they were ahead 49-43.  But the Celtics battled back behind good third quarter efforts from Boston’s Big 3 – Paul Pierce, Ray Allen and Kevin Garnett.  The Celtics scored 34 points in the quarter and led 77-71 at the end of three.

But in the final quarter, Wade showed the heart of a champion.  Normally a slasher and penetrator, he scored a flurry of treys created by his own crossovers and ball-handling.  The barrage had him looking at his hand – as if he were talking to it in disbelief – while he were returning to get into defensive position.  Wade’s dominance gave the Heat and 11-point lead, but the veteran Celtics had one last run in them.  They cut the lead back down to five, before the Heat were able to collect themselves and finish out the game.  Boston has some costly free throw misses – including one each by Pierce and Allen, and two by Kevin Garnett.  

Unfortunately for Wade, his supreme efforts are only prolonging the inevitable.  The Celtics return home for Game 5 to an environment that will be ripe for Boston to close out the series.

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