The Boston Celtics edged over the Toronto Raptors 92-87 in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference Semifinals on Friday, winning the series 4-3. They will meet the Miami Heat in the Conference Finals. Miami eliminated the regular season leader Milwaukee Bucks 4-1 in the other East Semifinals.

Despite the loss and the elimination, Toronto as the defending champions could leave raising their heads. They did not have their best-performing player when they won the title; the guy who shouldered most of their hopes did not reach 30 points in any of the seven games; their bench squad only began to play a bigger role from Game 6.

However, Toronto still managed to hold for so long and came back from 10+point trail twice in Game 7. They lost but they did it with honor.

Before Game 7, TNT revealed a pair of stats as a tip: in the three games each side won, they all beat the other in 3-point rate by over 10 percent. That meant shooting from downtown should be one of the deciding factors of the competition.

Then both Boston and Toronto limited each other's 3-point rate to below 30 percent. Toronto continued to cage Kemba Walker, Boston's best playmaker with their signature "Box-1" defense. As a result, Walker went only 5-16 to get 14 points, six rebounds and four assists. In response, Boston put a leash on Kyle Lowry – they did not want the 34-year-old to score court-high 33 points any more. As a result, Lowry missed 10 of his 15 attempts and was fouled out in the end.

Both sides needed someone else to stand out. Fred VanVleet and his teammates on the bench tried to shoulder the responsibility. They did the job well as VanVleet dropped team-high 20 points and hit four triples. Toronto's bench squad beat their Boston Counterparts again in scoring 27-7.

Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown and Marcus Smart stood out for Boston. Both Brown and Smart struggled from the 3-point line (they were together 3-17 from there) but the two contributed seven stills combined. That gave Boston a great number of transition chances via which the team scored 23 points, all of which went to Tatum, Brown and Smart. By contrast, Toronto as the league's second-best early offense team, only got 10 points in this way.

Then there was Tatum who put down 29 points, 12 rebounds, seven assists and buried four threes for Boston – all team highs. The 22-year-old is the second-youngest player to score at least 25+10+5 in Game 7 of the playoffs after Kobe Bryant. The rebound he got in the 34th second worth more than the following two free throws he made. Boston will need more of such performances from him in the coming series against Miami.

Another miracle in store for the Nuggets?

The Denver Nuggets claimed a comeback victory over the Los Angeles Clippers 111-105, making the series 3-2. The Clippers established 15+point lead twice in the game but failed to take the win in the end.

Kawhi Leonard and Paul George did their job as they got 62 points, 15 rebounds and 10 assists together. The two also drilled nine 3-pointers and 13 free throws. However, their efforts were wasted by Lou Williams and Montrezl Harrell. Williams and Harrell have won NBA Sixth Man of the Year awards four times together and they were supposed to make the best bench scoring pair. Instead, they finished 5-17 to get only 10 points combined in Friday's game.

Both Williams and Harrell are huge loopholes of defense and when they could not score as they did usually, they would backfire against the Clippers. The Nuggets made full use of their terrible defense in the fourth quarter. Jamal Murray kept chasing Williams in offense while Nikola Jokic repeatedly proved that there's nothing Harrell could do to stop him from helping the Nuggets score.

Jokic and Murray went 5-5 from the 3-point line to get in total 20 points and five assists in the last quarter.

Another key factor of the Nuggets' comeback win on Friday was Michael Porter Jr. The rookie was under serious criticism after he complained about coach for not being given enough opportunity in the team. Nonetheless, he drilled one triple and delivered one block in the last quarter to make great contributions to the team's win. By the way, it was Williams who was defending Porter when he made that shot.

Coach Doc Rivers of the Clippers has witnessed his opponents make a come back from 3-1 trail twice in his career – such miracles have happened only thrice in NBA history and one of them came from the Nuggets in the last round. Will it happen again?