The Boston Celtics crushed the Miami Heat 118-84 to complete an emphatic 4-1 series victory Wednesday and book their place in the second round of the NBA playoffs.

The postseason top seeds, who were upset by Miami in last year’s Eastern Conference finals, avenged that loss in spectacular fashion with a one-sided wire-to-wire rout at the TD Garden.

Jaylen Brown and Derrick White scored 25 points apiece to lead Boston, who barely noticed the absence of the injured Kristaps Porzingis.

The Celtics threw down the gauntlet in the first quarter, racking up a whopping 41 points to open up a commanding 18-point advantage.

They extended that lead to 22 points by half-time, and kept up the pressure in the third quarter to lead 98-66 heading into the final frame.

Boston head coach Joe Mazzulla could afford to rest his frontline players for the fourth with the game effectively won against an injury-hit Miami team missing Jimmy Butler and Jaime Jaquez Jr.

Mazzulla said the Celtics had not been thinking about last year’s series loss to Miami.

“I don’t really worry about what happened last year,” Mazzulla said. “At the end of the day I liked how we approached the series, regardless of who they were playing.

“It had an intentionality to it, had attention to detail, and had a consistent physicality,” he added.

“And that’s the most important thing, regardless of who we’re playing. We wake up tomorrow and we’ve got to do it all over again versus another team.”

Boston will now face either the fourth-seeded Cleveland Cavaliers or fifth seeds Orlando in the Eastern Conference semifinals. Cleveland lead that series 3-2.

The Celtics advance brimming with confidence after ruthlessly taking care of eighth-seeded Miami in five games.

White’s 25-point haul included five three-pointers while Jayson Tatum added 16 points including 12 rebounds with three assists.

Sam Hauser added 17 points off the bench while Jrue Holiday also cracked double figures with 10 points.

In Wednesday’s other playoff game, Luka Doncic delivered a 35-point performance as the Dallas Mavericks thrashed the Los Angeles Clippers 123-93 on the road to take a 3-2 series lead.

The 30-point margin of defeat was the Clippers’ heaviest ever NBA playoff loss.

Dallas, who can clinch the series with victory in game six back in Texas on Friday, pulled away toward the end of the first half to open up a 56-46 lead at the break.

They extended that advantage to 20 points after outscoring Los Angeles 33-23 in the third quarter and piled on in the fourth to open up a 32-point advantage at one stage.

Doncic finished with 35 points, 10 assists and seven rebounds, while Maxi Kleber added 15 from the bench. Kyrie Irving had a relatively quiet night with 14 points.

“In the playoffs it doesn’t matter if you win by one point or you win by 50 point — but it’s still a good win,” Doncic said afterwards.

“But the job is not done. We’ve got one more we need to win. We’re gonna get ready for next game.”

The Clippers were left licking their wounds after a humiliating loss that saw their offense make just nine of 35 attempted three-pointers, and 33 of 87 from the field.

Paul George and Ivica Zubac led the scoring with a meagre 15 points each, while James Harden added just seven points and Russell Westbrook six from the bench.

“We didn’t play our best game, we understand that collectively. We’ll be better for game six,” Clippers coach Tyronn Lue said.

“Overall we weren’t good on both sides of the basketball and just had a bad day.”

Asked what he attributed Harden’s poor performance to, Lue replied: “Being human. He’s allowed to have a bad game.”

LONDON: Millions of voters in England and Wales will cast their ballots on Thursday in an array of local elections that will be the last big test before a U.K. general election that all indicators show will see the Conservative Party ousted from power after 14 years.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak will hope he can point to successes, notably in a couple of key mayoral races, to douse talk that the Conservative Party will change leader again before the United Kingdom's main election, which could take place as soon as next month.
On the other hand, Labour Party leader Keir Starmer will hope Thursday's local elections confirm what opinion polls have shown for two years — that Labour is on course for power for the first time since 2010.
“The national context going into these local elections is very good for Labour and very bad for the Conservatives,” said Rob Ford, professor of politics at the University of Manchester.
As is often the case in British local elections, the run-up is about expectation management, so any outperformance can be painted as a success.
That's certainly the case with the Conservatives, who are widely predicted to lose around half of the 1,000 seats they are contesting. They have pointed out, for example, that the equivalent elections were held in 2021 when the government of then Prime Minister Boris Johnson was riding high following the rollout of the coronavirus vaccines.
Thursday's elections are important in themselves — voters decide who will run many aspects of their daily lives, such as bin collections, the state of the roads and local crime prevention measures, for the coming years.
But with a general election looming, they will be viewed through a national prism.
Here are five things to know:
What's happening?
Voters in England and Wales will go to the polls for local, mayoral, and police and crime commissioner elections.
The voting is the final test of public opinion before the general election, which has to take place by January 2025 but which Sunak, who has the power to decide on the date, has indicated will be in the second half of 2024.
As well as a number of mayoral votes, including in London where Sadiq Khan is expected to win a third term, there are more than 100 elections to local councils and nearly 40 for local police and crime commissioners.
There's also a special parliamentary election in Blackpool South, a long-time Labour seat that went Conservative in the last election in 2019, when Johnson won a big victory. The results will be announced in coming days. London's mayoral result isn't due until Saturday.
No elections are taking place in Scotland or Northern Ireland, the other constituent nations of the U.K.
What's at stake for Sunak?
Potentially his job. Sunak replaced Liz Truss, who quit after 45 days following a budget of unfunded tax cuts that roiled financial markets and sent borrowing costs for homeowners surging.
Sunak, who warned about the economic implications of Truss' plan, was supposed to be a steady hand after taking the top job in October 2022. If opinion polls are right, he's not improved the Conservatives' ratings, which had even prior to Truss, been battered by the circus surrounding Johnson, who was ousted over a series of ethics scandals.
With the Conservatives seemingly headed for one of their biggest-ever electoral defeats, there's mounting speculation Sunak may face a leadership battle if Thursday's elections are really bad.
Key to his survival could be the mayoral elections in the West Midlands and Tees Valley in the northeast of England. Should Conservative mayors Andy Street and Ben Houchen hold on, he may win some respite from restive lawmakers in his party. Should both lose, he may face trouble.
Is Labour headed for power?
In historical terms, Labour has a mountain to climb if it's going to form the next government.
It's performance in 2019 was its worst since 1935. Starmer has tried to bring the party back to the center of British politics after the five-year leadership of veteran left-winger Jeremy Corbyn.
Starmer's cautious approach has clearly worked if opinion polls are anything to go by. But it's fair to say that enthusiasm levels are far lower than those that heralded the arrival of Tony Blair ahead of the 1997 general election.
That may be partly due to the more challenging economic backdrop, but Starmer, formerly a human rights lawyer, lacks the razzmatazz of his predecessor. Even so, Starmer will hope Labour notches up big wins in areas it lost under Corbyn, in the north of England and in the Midlands.
One point of concern is how many traditionally Labour supporters in Muslim communities fail to vote in protest at the party's stance over the conflict in Gaza.
Are voters being tactical?
One of the contributing factors to Blair's landslide victory in 1997 came from so-called tactical voting, whereby some voters put aside their preferred political party and back whoever they think is most likely to defeat the Conservative candidate.
Tactical voting has reemerged in recent years and could become key in the general election. It usually involves voters sympathetic to Labour in parts of the country, such as southwest England, backing the much-smaller Liberal Democrats and Liberal Democrat supporters loaning votes to Labour in the Midlands and the north of England.
Conservative lawmakers across the U.K., even in supposedly safe seats, will be hugely concerned if voters think more tactically.
Pincer from the right?
The Conservatives don't just face a challenge from the left. Reform UK is trying to outflank it from the right.
Though it is standing in a few seats, Conservatives will worry that support for the party will see Labour and others come through the middle.
Reform UK, which claims to be tougher on issues such as immigration and on Brexit, has said it won't stand aside to give incumbent Conservative lawmakers an easier chance at the general election, as its former incarnation, The Brexit Party, did in 2019. The Blackpool South special election will be particularly interesting on that front.