NBA Playoff TakeaWays 2025: Stephen Curry leads past warriors, Cavs guards dominate the heat; Celtic and thunder rally

THE NBA playoffs continued on Sunday with the other four rounds of first rounds for the bottom. The seeds n ° 1 and n ° 8 will face the other, in addition to the seeds n ° 2 against n ° 7 in each conference.

Discover Yahoo Sports' Predictions for each first -round seriesIn addition to Kevin O'Connor ranking of 40 best players in the NBA qualifiers.

Here are the results and key dishes of Sunday matches:

Warriors 95, Rockets 85

The slow start of the Golden State Warriors did not end up injuring them after all.

The Warriors, fed by great outings of Stephen Curry and the new star Jimmy Butler, held out late to win a 95-85 victory against the Houston Rockets at the Toyota Center to launch their series. The victory put an end to what was a day full of erely through the league.

So much for the Dpoy chances of Draymond Green

Although Draymond Green has more than solidified as one of the best defenders in the League, and he was appointed finalist for the NBA defensive player award on Sunday, that certainly hadn't looked in the first minutes of Sunday evening.

Alperen şENGün pulled the best party from the green as soon as the door is left and set the tone right away.

ŞENGün collected eight points and six rebounds in the first quarter, which helped them take a 2-18 lead at the break. The two teams pulled a 3-16 handset from the 3-point line in the opening period, and Houston had only one bucket in the last three minutes of the quarter.

The Warriors then used this defensive stand and took off. They opened the second quarter on a 14-5 race, then preceded Houston 29-13 in the period to take a 13-point lead in the locker room. Stephen Curry emptied two 3 deep points during their last boost, including one where he crossed Fred Vanvleet.

Steph does things Steph

Butler and Curry broke out in the third quarter to push the Warriors to the victory of the eruption without too much problem. Butler struck his first 3 points halfway through the quarter to give the Warriors an advance of 20 points, their biggest at the time, then Curry followed him with an absolutely wild 3 point pointer who had Kevin Harlan scream, “geometrically who should not have happened!”

Just look:

But, instead of fleeing with the game, the Rockets put an end to the period on a race of 17-3 to reduce the game to figures to one figure.

Although the Rockets took place at less than three points at the start of the fourth quarter, it was as close as possible. The Warriors quickly closed the match and won the 10 -point victory, thanks in part to another long bucket of Curry.

ŞENGün led Houston with 26 points and nine rebounds in defeat. Jabari Smith Jr. added 11 points on the bench, and Vanvleet finished with 10 points and seven assists. They went to only 5 out of 27 of the line of 3 points. Their 85 points were a bottom of the season.

Curry finished with 31 points and pulled 5 out of 9 behind the Arc de Golden State. Butler added 25 points, seven rebounds and six assists, and Brandin Podziemski finished with 14 points. The Warriors were exceeded by 16 in victory. The Warriors have now won at least one eliminatory match on the road in 29 of their last 30 series.

Match 2 of the series is scheduled for Wednesday evening.

– Ryan Young

Cavaliers 121, heat 100

With 8:58 am to do in the fourth quarter on Sunday, the Miami Heat remained at a striking distance with a deficit of 92-85 against the most in mind Cleveland Cavaliers.

Then Ty Jerome arrived. The cavity goalkeeper appointed Sunday as a finalist of the sixth prize of the man of the year Hit a 3 pointer to extend Cleveland's advance to 10 and trigger a push of the riders to A victory of 121-100 match 1.

Jerome led the charge in the section while scoring 16 of his 28 points in the fourth quarter.

Jerome joined Donovan Mitchell (30 points) and Darius Garland (27 points) in the remarkable efforts in the back of the riders one day when Cleveland only committed seven reversals.

An offense of riders who led the League in an offensive note During the regular season, no signs of rust after a week's layoff from the conclusion of the regular season. The Cavs are very similar to pretenders to the east.

Evan Mobley takes up the seat

With Cleveland's Guard's cuisine, Evan Mobley took a secondary role in attack while totaling nine points and seven rebounds. This could become a trend in this series against a large heat area featuring Bam Adebayo and the Kell'el Ware off competition, who are both strong defenders of the post.

The Frontcourt match, which also includes the jarrett Allen (12 points, 11 rebounds, 3 interceptions) horsemen should be a convincing watch for the rest of the series.

This is a competitive heat team

Grizzlies of eighth seeded have shown no signs of life A historical beat by the Thunder Earlier Sunday. This Heat team is not the version of the east of these Grizzlies, despite the seed n ° 8 as a first seeded n ° 10 to get out of the game.

Erik Spoelstra is championship coach, and Tyler Herro and Adebayo are high -level stars and competitors. The heat is exceeded, but they are not withered after having released a deficit of 55-40 in the second quarter. They remained competitive and one figure as late as the middle of the fourth quarter. Do not expect the heat to turn around because the Sunday's match became uncontrollable late.

– JAson Owens

Celtics 103, Magic 86

For a section in the second quarter on Sunday, the locking defense of Orlando gave Magic fans hopes that they could compete with the reigning champions.

But the Boston Celtics opened things in the third trimester and crossed A 103-86 victory To take an advance of 1-0 on Orlando in their series of playoffs in the first round.

The Celtics traveled a wave of 30-18 quarter to transform a deficit of 49-48 at halftime into a 17-point flight victory. But the Celtics do not leave Sunday victory without worry.

Jayson Tatum plays after the fear of late injuries
With 8:28 to play, Jayson Tatum made a hard fall after a fault by Kentavious Caldwell-Pope on a Lay-Up attempt which was upgraded to a flagrant 1.

Caldwell-Pope hit the right elbow of Tatum while Tatum was trying to Dunk, and Tatum fell hard on his right wrist.

Tatum was sitting on the ground for several moments before going to the Celtics bench. He received medical care on the bench while the officials examined the fault. He stayed in the game and shot free throws after the examination determined that Caldwell-Pope's fault was obvious.

A free throw shooter of 81%, Tatum missed them both. But he continued to play in the section and hit his first 3 points from the match a few moments later, supporting the concern he dealt with all kinds of impactful injury.

Tatum stayed in the game until the Celtics drew their runners in the last two minutes. He finished with 17 points and 14 rebounds and was seen to bend his wrist on the bench late in the match.

Head coach Joe Mazzulla told journalists after the match This tatum “is fine”.

Tatum told journalists that X -rays have been negative.

Can Orlando's defense have an impact on this series?
Orlando's offensive is inconsistent and unlikely to follow the rhythm of Boston's fire power this series. If the magic hopes to steal a game or put pressure on the Celtics, they will have to rely on a unit that published the second best defensive note of the NBA during the regular season.

This defense appeared at the end of the second quarter while Orlando closed the half-time on a 25-12 race to take a point in the break. But the Boston offensive led by Derrick White (30 points) and his own defense among the first five Finally prevailed to put the game out of reach long before the final buzzer.

– Jason Owens

Thunder 131, Grizzlies 80

There are eruptions and then There is what the Thunder n ° 1 did To Grizzlies No. 8 in their first match of eliminatory series. This was probably an eliminatory match of the NBA in the first round resembled a university basketball pre-season match in which a candidate in the national championship played a directional program in mid-me-in-law. Maybe even a junior college.

Journalists will have to check if Memphis players are OK after what happened in the Paycom Center court. What was perpetrated will have to be cleaned before these two teams play on Tuesday in match 2.

Relentless location from the start
Memphis never had the opportunity. The Thunder seemed everyone in the championship and well rested with a week off after the end of the regular season last Sunday. After the Grizzlies took a brief advance of 9-8 five minutes after the start of the first quarter, Oklahoma City triggered hell, finishing the first 12 minutes with an advance of 32-20 and by ahead of the 31-10 grizzlears in the second quarter.

If the Grizzlies had aspirations to be more competitive in the second half, the Thunder quickly broke this notion with a sequence of 10-0 which led to a possible third quarter of 44 points. If it was a boxing match, the corner would have thrown the sponge. A fighting referee would probably not have let the grizzly groves go out to play in the second period. It was the fifth largest margin of victory in the history of the NBA in the playoffs.

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander only played 23 minutes and scored 15 points, almost passed Easter Sunday.

When asked after the match on Memphis's performance, Ja Morant replied: “We will never play so badly.”

In all honesty, it would be quite difficult to do.

The Thunder front area dominates in the total gap
Oklahoma City had a huge advantage on the front line, led by 20 points by Jalen Williams and 19 from Chet Holmgren. On the other side, Jaren Jackson Jr. and Zach Edey only scored four points.

The Thunder had eight team blocks, annihilating all the attempts by the grizzly ones to take the ball to the basket. Being satisfied with exterior shots did not work either, Memphis pulling 6 out of 34 out of 3 points and 34% in total.

Yes, it was just a match in a series of best seven. But how do the grizzles recover to put together a kind of challenge? Match 2 was running Tuesday at 7:30 p.m. he.

– Ian Casselberry

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